


Living in Peace, Preparing for War

by LadyIvy



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: BAMF goblins, Evil Dumbledore, Gen, Good Severus Snape, Hufflepuff Harry, Humor, M/M, Snarky Harry
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-09-20
Updated: 2017-12-30
Packaged: 2018-02-18 04:22:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 27
Words: 99,723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2335106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyIvy/pseuds/LadyIvy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A somewhat more curious Harry Potter reaches out to the goblins after his first trip to the Alley.  The response he gets back changes everything.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Will eventually be slash, but since this starts when Harry is eleven, not for quite some time.

As Hagrid left his office after reporting on trip to give Harry Potter his Hogwarts letter and help him buy his school supplies, Headmaster Dumbledore resisted the urge to rub his hands together and cackle in glee. While he certainly felt he had every right to gloat over the next milestone in his decade’s long plan for the Wizarding world, he knew that such actions would not fit the ‘barmy, twinkling-eyed, benevolent headmaster’ persona he had worked so hard to create. And even in the sanctity of his office, he could not be too careful, as he was never truly alone here. The portraits obeyed him to a point as headmaster, but their true loyalty was to the school and not any one person. He could not afford for any of them (particularly that bloody Slytherin Black) to get suspicious now. But events were finally moving again! Yesterday, Harry Potter formally replied that he would be starting at Howarts as a first year come September first. Today, Hagrid had taken Harry around the Alley and helped him get his school supplies. Hagrid’s just related sniffling tale of escorting Harry around Diagon Alley to get his school things clearly showed that Harry had no idea of his true place in wizarding society or the heritage he stood to inherit when he reached his majority.

That is, if he lived to reach his majority.

Such as shame he had survived the attack as a child. And even more of a shame that Hagrid had run into Black on his way back out of the rubble. Part giants were hard to obliviate, but he would have been tempted to try if there hadn’t been another witness. And by the time Black got himself arrested and thrown in Azkaban, too many other people were involved, and the news that Harry had survived had spread too far to be suppressed. And there would have been too much scrutiny to risk arranging directly for Harry to be killed while in the muggle world. If Harry had had a convenient accident while living with those oh so delightful relatives (and really, muggles were really too easily swayed by mind arts) than it would have been tragic but his own hands would have been clean with all the blame going to those relatives. Since that hadn’t happened, he had to bring Harry Potter back to the wizarding world as expected. There would have been too many questions if a letter hadn’t been sent, and if efforts hadn’t been made to ensure a response when the initial letters had gone out. But now that he was going to be back, he would be under Dumbledore’s sphere of influence once again. Able to be molded and shaped and guided to the paths and choices Dumbledore wanted him to take to ensure the success of Dumbledore’s plans.

So Headmaster Dumbledore gloated silently and without outward signs of his happiness. Soon, Harry Potter would arrive at Hogwarts, and with any luck at all, would die horribly in an unfortunate, dreadful accident with plenty of witnesses (and an airtight alibi for himself) before the year was out.

 


	2. Chapter One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And so it begins...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer - Not my characters or world, just my ideas and words.

Harry Potter was not, as they say, a happy camper. It was nearing midnight on the night after his trip to Diagon Alley and Harry had question after question running through his head keeping him awake. Nothing about the events of the past few days made any sense. If his family was rich, why did his Aunt and Uncle always tell him he was a burden? If they knew he was magical, why lie to him about his parents’ deaths? And how was it that pretty much everyone in the wizarding world seemed to know his name and what he looked like? Why did Hagrid have a key to HIS bank vault? How had Hagrid gotten the key to begin with? What was going on? There were just too many questions.

“I don’t get it, Hedwig.” Harry whispered. “Why did nobody ever visit me? When I ran into people like that Mr. Diggle who bowed to me, why did none of them notice I was wearing too big clothes or how Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia yelled at me? Why did they only bow, or nod, and never actually SAY anything? If I am this great person who everyone loves, if I did such a wonderful thing by getting rid of that Dark Wizard, why does it seem like I was thrown away like a piece of trash – a spent weapon that served its purpose and was now useless?”. Hedwig hooted softly back at Harry, and nuzzled his ear with her beak as if to say ‘I hear you’.

“I have to go back. I need to know more about what happened, at least what they say happened.” With that decision made, Harry took a piece of the parchment Hagrid had helped him buy, and finding a biro in the junk his cousin had left behind in the room (because he was NOT trying to figure out writing with a feather and ink when it was this late), he wrote a letter to the bank, asking if there was any way to exchange some of his wizard money for non-wizard money, and if so, could he do it via his owl since he needed the normal money to be able to travel to the bank to begin with. Harry knew that without any ‘normal’ money, he couldn’t get back to the Alley to do anything. While there must be magical ways to travel, Harry didn’t know any, and to take the underground, or a bus, or anything really would require regular non wizarding money as he could not see the underground station accepting sickles. Since he also didn’t see his aunt allowing him to borrow the money, or his uncle agreeing to drive him back to the Leaky Cauldron, he had to get some normal money of his own to be able to return to the Alley and seek some answers. With that task complete and Hedwig on her way to London, Harry finally turned over and went to sleep.

Xoxoxoxox

“Get up!”

“Get UP, you worthless lay about. Dudder’s breakfast won’t cook itself, you know. Just because you will be leaving soon doesn’t mean you can forget about your chores until you do. So get UP!” Aunt Petunia’s screeching came through the door of the smallest bedroom in the house at Number 4, Privet Drive. Harry rolled over and sighed. ‘No’, he thought to himself, ‘Dudder’s breakfast won’t cook itself, and better to go down and cook it than risk getting shoved back into the cupboard under the stairs. At least in the bedroom he could read his new books by the light through the window after he was sent to bed; in the cupboard, if he kept the light on his uncle was likely to take the bulb out so he wouldn’t waste power.

Xoxoxoxox

After breakfast was over (full English for Dudders and Uncle Vernon, some porridge and fruit for Aunt Petunia, and the leftover burnt toast for Harry), and the dishes cleaned and put away, Harry returned to his room to look over his school books more closely. If he was going to a new school where he couldn’t be punished for outdoing Dudley’s grades, he was going to make the most of it.

Two hours later, deep into the Standard Book of Spells, Grade 1, Harry was startled by a tapping sound at the window. Looking up, he saw Hedwig was back, and she had a small envelope tied to her leg! Eagerly, Harry opened the window fully to allow Hedwig back inside, and untied the envelope from her leg. As soon as it came free, it expanded nearly three times in size, looking more like a package than a letter. Harry sat back down on his bed, and with a deep breath, opened the clasp and emptied it out onto the covers.

A normal sized envelope with his name written on it slid out first, but it was quickly covered by what seemed to Harry to be an enormous amount of pound notes. It seemed to be far too many to have fit in even a packet as large as he had in his hand, but maybe if magic could shrink the entire thing down so Hedwig could carry it, magic could make the envelope hold more than it looked like it should be able to. That was an interesting thought. Dudley was always taking things away from Harry, and if Harry left anything sitting around Dudley was sure to find it and destroy it sooner or later, just because he could. If things could be shrunk down, and made lighter, maybe he could carry everything he owned with him all the time. That would be brilliant.

Shaking his head at himself for getting sidetracked, and hearing the door slam downstairs, Harry moved to gather up the notes and shove them under his pillow. He didn’t want them visible if one of his oh so loving family took it in their heads to enter his room. He’d get a better storage location in a bit, but he really wanted to read the letter the goblins had sent to see if it explained why they sent the money directly without waiting for however many sickles or galleons what he was sent was worth. Harry opened the envelope and started reading the message inside.

_Lord Potter,_

Wait, what? LORD?!?!?!

_We at Gringotts are pleased to facilitate your exchange. We trust in your honor to repay the funds advanced given the known balance of your trust vault in order to expedite your ability to return to the Magical world you have been separated from for so long. We salute you as a proven warrior, who vanquished his foe while yet a small child, and look forward to chanting tales of your future battles to come._

Battles yet to come? I don’t remember vanquishing Voldemort as a baby, and I can’t fight – look at how Dudley and his gang beat me up whenever they can catch me! What battles are they thinking of – seeing me getting slaughtered like a sheep? And who do they think I will be fighting?

_Know that wizards are not the only ones to have seers to see the shape of things to come. To prevent the coming apocalypse, Gringotts is prepared to reinstate the ancient treaty and acknowledge you as the current Lord Potter as an ally and partner. May our gold flow freely and our enemies blood even more so._

_In Peace as in War_

_Ever on Guard_

_Ragnok, Director of Gringotts_

What the bloody hell is going on?


	3. Chapter Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer - Not mine, just playing in JKR's sandbox for a while.

Chapter Two

Even more confused now than he had been last night, Harry packed all his spell books back into his trunk and locked it shut, then pulled the pound notes back out from under the pillow he had hidden them under, and grabbed his wand. He wanted answers, and he wanted them NOW.

Checking the clock, Harry realized he had only a few minutes before the next bus ran past down at the corner. He had never ridden it before, but long summers spent working on his aunt’s garden meant he was well aware of the normal schedule. He also knew it had a stop close enough to the underground that he could take back into London, retracing the path Hagrid had taken him on yesterday to get back to Diagon Alley. He only hoped his aunt or Dudley didn’t try to stop him as he left the house. Stopping as he was about to leave his room, Harry turned back and grabbed one Aunt Petunia’s old gardening hats from the pile of worn and torn items piled in the bottom of the closet. It wasn’t ideal, but hopefully it would keep his face, and forehead, out of sight long enough for him to get into the bank. Harry did not want to try to deal with a mob scene like yesterday on his own.

Xoxoxox

Harry walked softly into the bank, bowing back to the goblin who opened the doors for him as he approached. He wasn’t sure what his next step should be. The original plan, make another withdrawal, then hit the bookstore for some recent history books, didn’t seem like the best course after that letter. But walking up to a window and asking for the Director of Gringotts didn’t seem right either.

First things first, he needed to get more galleons out of his vault so he could repay the loan, no, the ADVANCE, the goblin director had sent. He wasn’t sure what the difference was between a loan and an advance, but he was positive the goblins thought there was a difference, and he didn’t want to insult anyone who worked in a building guarded by plenty of beings with really sharp looking spears. So get more wizarding money, repay the advance, and see what happens. If the goblins considered him an ally, maybe one of them would ask him to talk. If that didn’t occur, he would ask to where he could see a copy of the treaty that Ragnok had mentioned in the letter. He **really** wanted to know what the goblins expected of him, particularly in terms of fighting and battle. He was better at running and hiding, and he didn’t think that would go over too well with someone who wrote about seeing enemy blood as a good thing.

With a deep breath, Harry walked up to a window. “Key?” snapped the goblin, without even looking up from his ledger. “I also need to arrange to repay an advance provided earlier today, but I am not sure of the amount owed in galleons, since I was given pound notes,” Harry replied as he slid his small gold key across the counter. “Advance – Oh, you.” Harry’s key was pushed back with one long finger. “Down to the end there. Ask for Sharptooth. Next!”

Okay, that was unexpected. He stepped back and walked in the direction the goblin had pointed, looking around for someone to ask. The windows at that end of the counter had little wooden doors covering the normal openings behind the bars, and seemed quite deserted. There weren’t as many candles at this end of the bank, and the light from the high chandeliers didn’t seem to reach as well here. No other customers were in the area, and it was well away from where he and Hagrid had entered the cart system the prior day.

“State your business!”

Jumping a little at the sharp tone, Harry turned to see a goblin staring at him intently. It looked angry, but really, all the goblins Harry had seen in the past two days had looked angry. “I was told to ask for Sharptooth. I need to get some money from my vault, and repay an advance Ragnok sent me earlier today, but I am not sure how many gallon’s worth of pound notes I was sent, since I don’t know the exchange rate.”

“Follow me.” With that short, flat statement, the goblin turned on its heel and started walking toward a blank wall. Shrugging his shoulders, Harry followed.

The goblin didn’t break stride as it approached the wall, walking straight through as if the wall didn’t exist. ‘Okay’, Harry thought. ‘If a wall can open when tapped by a wand, why can’t a wall just let someone walk right through? I hope that whatever let that goblin pass lets me in too, or this will hurt.’

With that last thought, Harry suppressed a small wince – he didn’t think it was a good idea to look fearful when going to meet people who talked about seeing the blood of enemies run freely. Firming his resolve, Harry made sure he didn’t hesitate as he approached, but also walked right up to the wall as if he expected it to let him through. Even with knowing he was expected, and seeing the goblin go through right before him, Harry was slightly surprised that walking through didn’t feel like anything – whatever it looked like, it felt like the wall didn’t exist as he passed through where it seemed to be.

On the other side facing the wall area Harry had just walked through, still looking angry, was his guide. After a very short pause, with a bare twitch of an eyebrow, the goblin turned on its heel and continued walking down a very long, very dimly lit corridor. As Harry followed, he wondered if the wall was some sort of test, and if the goblin hadn’t expected him to pass.

Shortly, they came to a widening in the walkway. Along the sides were alcoves that didn’t have floors. ‘Odd’, thought Harry. His guide walked up to one of them, and glanced back at Harry with what was clearly a challenging look on his face.

“Director’s office!”

And with that statement, the goblin hopped into the alcove and dropped out of sight.

Harry didn’t think he could he could faulted for taking a moment to think about that. It wasn’t every day you saw someone jump, no not even jump, just a little hop so both feet were together as it began to fall, into a dark shaft that went down who knows how far. With that thought, Harry stepped up to the edge and looked down. ‘Yep, who knows how far; there isn’t any light or anything to show the bottom, and those carts went down a ways yesterday. Well, I’ve come this far. And if the director was writing about being allies, I don’t think this is going to kill me’.

Harry practically shouted “Director’s office!” as he closed his eyes and jumped forward. He didn’t know what to expect, but he figured at this point he was going to go with the flow and see what happened. Hopefully at the end of this, he’d be meeting with the director and could get at least some answers for the questions the letter had raised.

‘This isn’t so bad’, Harry thought. ‘It feels like I jumped onto another section of floor and I’m not falling at all - how weird.’ Harry opened his eyes, but there was nothing to see. It felt like he was standing in place, doing nothing. He looked over his shoulder, but the hallway he had come from was no longer visible. As in front of him, there was nothing to see. He was in the middle of utter complete darkness. ‘How very weird.’

Suddenly, in front of him was light – an archway that looked like the entrance to the alcove he had just jumped through appeared, and standing in the hallway it opened up to was his goblin guide. The eyebrow definitely raised this time, and for a longer time. Once again, the goblin turned on its heel and walked away without a word. Harry followed, also in silence, figuring it had worked so far.

This time the walk didn’t take as long, and it wasn’t a blank stretch of wall they were approaching. The hallway widened out into a larger space, carved out of rock as the hallway they were leaving had been. It was too regularly shaped to simply be called a cave, but there had been no efforts to cover the bare rock that formed the walls. Harry thought he could still see tool marks – the walls were reasonably smooth, but certainly not perfectly smooth. At the other side of this space, was another archway, with two goblin guards standing on either side. Their spears were angled to cross in front of the open arch, and instead of the uniforms seen above, these two were wearing armor. Plain, heavy, clearly meant for battle and not show, armor.

Harry’s guide, who still hadn’t explained anything, walked up to the arch. Stopping just shy of the crossed spears, it said “Sharptooth escorting Harry Potter to Director Ragnok, as instructed.” The guards pulled their respective spears straight, leaving the archway clear. Sharptooth strode forward without even a glance back this time. Harry shrugged again, and followed him through the arch.


	4. Chapter Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer - I own not the great Harry Potter, only the words I write. 
> 
> I am working on writing longer chapters (and hey, each chapter is getting longer). I also write until I hit what I feel is a good stopping place, which does tend to be what other people call 'cliffhangers' a great deal of the time (not always major cliffhangers like 'is someone dead?', but it does tend to be at a break in the middle of a scene and not at a break between different scenes, if that makes sense. It's just how my brain functions.
> 
> Lastly, I don't currently have a beta, so while I do spell and grammar check each chapter, and re-read at least the previous chapter for continuity flow, and read the current chapter a few times before posting to try to catch errors, I make no guarantees that I have caught all spelling, grammar, and/or continuity errors.

Chapter Three

Whatever Harry thought he was expecting, this wasn’t it. He had thought vaguely that a director might have a desk, that there might be papers, or piles of coins to be counted. There might be chests of gold, or cabinets with drawers. Maybe another goblin standing by waiting for orders. This wasn’t that. This wasn’t anything like he remembered Vernon describe his office as being like, when he would boast to Dudley about being a manager and bossing people around. Granted, these were goblins and not human, but the bank above didn’t seem that different from a human bank (though the vault area was certainly nothing like human banks).

Harry didn’t know what to compare this to. It was a large area, and like the entry way a little too regular to be called a cave but not exactly like a room either. The floor was mostly bare rock, but there was a large circle off to the one side that looked like something else – sand maybe. There were racks of weapons everywhere he looked – hanging from the walls, free standing in different areas on the floor, even some large pieces hanging from the ceiling of whatever this area should be called. There wasn’t a desk per say, but along the back wall was another alcove with shelves carved out of the rock on both sides. Sitting in this alcove was a goblin.

And it was the first goblin with a smile on its face that Harry had seen.

Harry blinked, and shuddered. Goblins could just keep on looking angry, if that was what a smile looked like. The goblin’s smile showed glimpses of sharp, pointed teeth through a bare parting of thin lips, and the narrowed eyes above looked like they were evaluating the best place to hit with a weapon that was ready to strike (even though Harry couldn’t actually see such a thing). Looking at that smile, Harry felt like the goblin was ready to kill and eat him raw.

“Come forward, you don’t stop at solid walls or dark shafts but a plain room has you freeze? Get moving, the Director is waiting,” snapped his escort.

Harry hadn’t even realized his feet had stopped moving when he saw that smile. Shaking his head a bit, he started walking again. If the Director was going to hurt him (which didn’t seem likely if he wanted to be allies), there was nothing Harry could do to stop it. And Sharptooth was right, jumping down a dark shaft with no visible bottom was a lot more foolish than walking across a room to meet with someone who had invited him to be here.

Harry looked around a bit more as he crossed the large space. On the other side of the sandy area was a small set of bleachers – empty at the moment. There were some trunks scattered along the walls under those racks of weapons that didn’t hang to the floor. Harry didn’t see any other goblins in the room, but didn’t assume they weren’t there. The racks of weapons, stand of bleachers, and mostly dim light meant that there could be others around that he just couldn’t see. It didn’t seem like a goblin would hide, but there was a difference between hiding and staying concealed while looking out for danger. Thanks to Dudley and his gang, Harry knew both very well. He had started out just simply hiding when he was younger, but that meant if his hiding failed he was pretty much done. Staying concealed while looking for danger meant having a plan, and an escape route, and hopefully warning before being found to implement the plan and escape route. So he could easily think that the goblins might turn that around to staying concealed to be able to do an ambush. Dudley tried ambushes on occasion, but because he was too large to really effectively hide anywhere, and he was too stupid to realize he wasn’t actually hidden, they rarely worked. But the fact that he tried meant Harry was familiar with the idea, and he thought the goblins might be better at it.

“Lord Potter, welcome to Gringotts.”

Oh, he was across the room already. “Um, thank you. I’m sorry, but … Lord?” Harry stammered.

“You are the last surviving member of your paternal line. That makes you the bearer of the family title of Lord, granted when Salazar Slytherin’s last surviving descendant – who was female and could not take the title – married one of your direct male ancestors some 600 years ago. The family name at that point was Peverell I believe. It changed to Potter some 400 years ago and has been Potter ever since.”

“Oh. I didn’t… No one… What does that mean? I’m sorry, but I really don’t understand what is going on. No one has explained anything. I find out I’m a wizard two days ago, find out my parents didn’t really die in a car crash, and that they left me money and weren’t drunks and worthless, and now I’m a Lord, and I’m really confused.”

Ragnok’s eyebrow raised, and the smile that still been on his face dropped off. “You didn’t know you were a wizard? You didn’t know you are a Lord? Who did Dumbledore put you with, that you know nothing of your heritage – of your obligations? Dumbledore!” snarled the Director, who now looked just as angry as every other goblin Harry had met in his admittedly short experience in the magical world.

“I live with Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon, my mother’s sister and her husband. And sorry, obligations? What are obligations? And I’m sure Hagrid said Dumbledore was Headmaster of the school, why does he have anything to with this?”

“Duties, responsibilities. Even without reinstating the ancient treaty between the Slytherin line and the Goblin nation, just being the last surviving Potter means that you have those depending on you for support – those tied to your family by alliance bonds. But if you know nothing of that, if you don’t even know of your parents and their sacrifices and deaths in battle, then Dumbledore has more to answer for than previously thought. He has long been suspected of being a thief, but the paperwork was always in order. He was assigned as your guardian after the wizards threw your godfather into their prison. He ends up the guardian for a lot of orphans in the magical world somehow, and those orphans always seem to end up giving him most if not all of their family heirlooms and gold. But the paperwork is always filled out correctly with signatures and seals, the tests showed the signatures were not forced and were written by the proper hand, and the orphans themselves never came back to file a complaint of theft. It has happened too regularly to be coincidence, but the goblins can’t prove anything as there is no real evidence showing a crime, just a pattern and suspicions. And no human will investigate because it is the great Dumbledore who is the leader of the Light, defeater of Grindelwald, etc.” This was snarled out in a very bitter tone by the Director, as bad and nasty as Harry had ever heard from his relatives, only not shouted out as they would have, but rather said in a low, quiet tone that Harry decided was worse than the shouting he was used to.

Harry blinked at the goblin, and didn’t say anything, trying to determine how to respond. After a moment, the Director continued speaking.

“Well, we can’t change the past. We can just work to a better future. Tell me what you do know of your family, your history, and your place in the wizarding world.”

“Um. I know my parents are dead, and I don’t think I have any other relatives other than my Aunt Petunia, Uncle Vernon, and Dudley. I know people think I killed that Voldemort guy when I was a baby but I don’t remember it. And I’m some sort of hero because of it – the Boy-Who-Lived. And I know what you just told me, about being the last Potter, and being a Lord because of someone named Slytherin marrying one of my dad’s ancestors. Um, that’s about it.”

“Pitiful. Shameful. Unworthy of name and honor, not even fit to try to recoup his honor by individual combat!”

Harry shrunk into himself and began inching back as the Director started ranting. He didn’t know how to use any of the weapons scattered in easy reach, and more importantly he didn’t know to block or fight against someone using any of the weapons lying around. He didn’t want to be anywhere near anybody that angry with this many weapons around. Experience with Uncle Vernon showed that when people got angry they would lash out at the cause, or at any convenient target if the cause wasn’t available. Harry didn’t know if the Director was shouting at him or just shouting, but he wanted to get out of range in either case. Uncle Vernon hit harder if he ran and was caught quickly, but sometimes if he could run and hide for long enough Uncle Vernon would forget how mad he was and then it was just a quick smack around and back to chores.

“Feed him to the dragons, drop him in a pit filled with snakes – he doesn’t deserve death given by a warrior – drown him in the sea, choke him on his own beard…”

Well, Harry didn’t have a beard, so at least that meant the Director wasn’t saying all those things about him.

Suddenly, Harry’s foot hit something solid and he froze. He was sure he was going back exactly as he had come forward, and there was a pretty straight clear corridor from the door to the where the Director was, so he didn’t know what could have gotten in his way. Harry looked over his shoulder. Sharptooth was standing right behind him, and had put the blunt end of a spear down to stop Harry’s retreat. His mouth was stretched wide in what could only be termed a grin, revealing a multitude of teeth that lived up to his name. “It’s not polite to leave the Director’s presence without being dismissed.”

“I wasn’t leaving, I was just backing up a bit.” Harry said, rather unconvincingly.

“Of course you weren’t leaving. You weren’t dismissed yet. Now turn back around and get back in front of the Director!”

Harry wasn’t sure he was going to make it back out of the bank without injury at this rate.

He turned back around to face the Director, who had stopped ranting and was looking at him with a look on his face Harry couldn’t read. “I’m not angry with **you** , Lord Potter”.

“Um, okay.” Harry didn’t move forward right away, regardless of the goblin behind him. He looked to be far enough away that Ragnok couldn’t hit him with any of the swords lying around, and he wasn’t interested in getting any closer until he was sure the goblin wouldn’t strike out. Harry realized then that he couldn’t feel the spear against his foot any more, and darted to the side so he could get both goblins in sight, not wanting to feel the pointed end of the spear if Sharptooth felt he was disrespectful of the Director.

Both goblins raised eyebrows at that action. “We have no intention of harming you, Lord Potter,” said he Director. You are an invited guest, brought here to discuss renewing the ancient treaty, and while I understand this is the first knowledge you have of it, honor will not permit us to let you come to any harm during this visit.”

Harry heard the unspoken message – Ragnok wasn’t saying no harm at all, or no harm in future visits. Oddly though, that was enough for him to relax. He hadn’t seen any proof of the goblins claims, but they didn’t seem like the type to joke. And a promise that was limited in terms of time was far more likely to be kept than one that was supposed to be longer lasting. Harry knew about those; ‘do all these chores, over and over and perfect all year and Santa will think you are a good boy next year, instead of giving you a stone like this year.’ Those promises were never true. Just another thing for the Dursleys to tease him with. But this was a statement that felt real, and was only for a short time right now. Aunt Petunia said things like that sometimes – ‘keep quiet while I have ladies over for tea, and I will let you have the remains while you clean up’ for instance – as long as Dudley stayed out with his friends long enough there were always little sandwiches and whatnot left, and he could eat his fill. Well, eat as much as there was left at any rate, it rarely was enough for him to actually feel full, but since his Aunt Petunia never wanted to seem cheap or like a bad hostess she always made more than the ladies would eat. He wasn’t allowed the cakes and dainties that were left, those were always saved for Dudley as a bribe for staying out of the house so his Aunt could have a good gossip. But there was always a good handful of the small sandwiches with the crusts cut off – little cucumber and prawn, and egg and watercress and whatnot. His Aunt made two or three different kinds every time, and enough for each lady to have 2 of each kind if she wanted. But most of her gossip buddies never had more than 2 or 3 total, which left about half the sandwiches as remains. They weren’t large sandwiches, a bite or two each, but it was the one constant decent meal Harry could remember having outside of school lunches.

“Lord Potter?”

‘Oh, I need to stop doing that.’ It was one thing for Harry to get lost in his own thoughts when his caretakers were lecturing at him – he’d heard the rants so many times he could recite them in his sleep by now, but he really needed to stop doing it when he was around other people. Beings. Whatever.

“Yes Sir. Sorry Sir. Just a lot to take in.”

“Lord Potter, I would like one of our healers to take a look at you before you leave. If your Aunt and Uncle never told you of the magical world, I doubt they’ve gotten you any of your magical vaccines. With your permission, I will go have Sharptooth arrange it while I go over the terms of the treaty with you, and answer as many of your questions as I can.”

“That sounds okay. I didn’t realize magical medicine was different.”

The Director looked over at Sharptooth “Healer Rathgrow. The small ritual room will provide privacy for Lord Potter.” With a bow, Sharptooth turned and exited. “Now, come sit, and I will review the treaty with you.”


	5. Chapter Four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry gets some answers, only to end up with more questions.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer - Not mine, just playing in the Harry Potter world.

As Harry was led down the hall to the ritual room, his mind was reeling over the details of the treaty that Director Ragnok expected him to sign. His ancestor had certainly been thorough in detailing what was expected. The scroll never seemed to end, and even after the several hours the Director spent reviewing it with him they still hadn’t finished it. Mutual protection and support seemed to be what it came down to, but every single little possibility was written out, along with the expected counter action that either the goblins or the Slytherin Lord was supposed to take in response. It was impossible to keep track of it all! Director Ragnok approved of Harry’s desire to read and understand the scroll’s contents before he signed it (one thing Harry did retain from his Uncle Vernon’s rants about his work was the importance of never signing anything without reading the fine print. One of the salespeople had done that last year, and Uncle Vernon had lost a bonus because of it). But it meant that the treaty still wasn’t signed, because the original wasn’t in English (at least not English Harry could read) and Harry wouldn’t sign it until he knew exactly what it said. There was a translating charm, but Harry had to be the one to cast it and he was having trouble mastering it. Since it was supposed to be a 5th year charm, and he hadn’t even started his 1st year, Harry wondered that the Director had even had him try. Meanwhile, the Director was reading the scroll to Harry (almost like a very boring bedtime story), translating into modern English as he went. So it was slow going. Ragnok had been very patient though, and answered all of Harry’s questions. He had asked a few of his own, about Harry’s life so far, where he lived (not the address but about who he lived with and how they treated him). Harry didn’t want to lie, but he didn’t want to really talk about the Dursleys with the goblins. He answered the Director’s questions with the bare minimum information he thought he could get away with. He was pretty certain Ragnok understood a lot more than he actually said though.

“In here, human.”

Harry looked up with start. Sharptooth had come to a stop in front of another archway in the wall, though this one had doors fitting into it. The goblin was stroking a metal plate on the side of the door with one long finger, and the door started to swing open. Sharptooth motioned to Harry to enter, and turned to set itself like a sentry in the corridor.

“You aren’t coming in?”

The goblin gave Harry a rather unpleasant look. “Healers don’t like extra people cluttering up their space while they work. I’ll wait here to escort you to your vault when you are finished.”

That reassured Harry that this couldn’t take too long. With the time he’d spent listening to Ragnok read through the treaty and the time it took to travel from Little Whinging to London it had to be past lunch time already, and Harry was worried he might not be back in time to start dinner before Uncle Vernon got home. That would mean punishment, and maybe a return to his cupboard. But if the goblin was going to wait it should be pretty fast, then a quick trip to his vault (he still needed to know how many galleons he needed to repay that advance, darn it!), and he could be back on the train and get home to start dinner when he needed to. With that goal in mind, Harry entered the room Sharptooth indicated. As soon as he was inside the door shut behind him, without a touch as the lone goblin in the room was standing on the other side of a low stone table with odd markings carved into the side and top.

“Uh, Healer –“Harry tried desperately to remember the name Ragnok had said when he mentioned Harry seeing a healer, but his mind was overwhelmed with the various clauses and conditions from the treaty.

“Healer Rathgrow, Lord Potter. Please come and lie down on the altar.”

‘ALTAR!?!?!?!’ “Um, I thought the Director said I needed magical vaccines. Aren’t those just an injection or something? Why do I have to lie down?” ‘And I don’t know if I want to lie down on something called an ALTAR like a sacrifice’.

“I do not have access to any of your records, so I need to do a scan to determine what healing you need. To do that, you have to lie down on the altar so I can examine you in both body and magic. The altar is inscribed with runes that help channel the magic through your body to give a complete picture of your current condition. It’s not going to hurt you, Lord Potter,” said the healer in an impatient tone.

Harry still wasn’t keen on the idea of lying down on something called an altar that looked much less like the examination tables in the school nurse’s office and much more like something out of one of those pictures of places that were used to hold sacrifices to the gods that the Sunday school teacher used to explain why heathens were bad and worshiping the One True G-D was good. Harry didn’t know how good worshiping G-D was since the Dursleys went to church every week but still treated Harry like a slave and locked him in a cupboard for years, but he did know he didn’t want to be sacrificed. But the Director had promised he would be safe during this visit, and he figured it was still the same visit, so Harry stepped forward and lay down on the stone slab. The healer stood at his feet, raised a long staff into the air, and started chanting in a language Harry didn’t recognize.

The runes carved into the altar started to glow, and Harry tried to lift his head to better see the goblin healer but found himself frozen into place unable to move. As the scan continued, Harry quickly decided that the healer had lied to him to get him to cooperate, because this hurt like the blazes. His head felt like it was on fire, centered on what he thought was his scar. His chest wasn’t too far behind his head in terms of pain – something was squeezing around his ribs and it felt like he couldn’t breathe.

Harry tried to roll off the stone, tried to sit up, to make a motion with his hands or speak long enough to ask the healer to stop whatever it was doing but he was locked into place with the pain building higher with every breath he managed to pull in past the constriction in his lungs. His eyes started to water from the pain and his vision was going white. His chest felt hot now too, but that heat was overwhelmed by his forehead that felt like a furnace. Harry was surprised his skin wasn’t melting and dripping down the sides of his head it felt so hot, and once more he opened his mouth, this time to scream. Faintly surprised that screaming worked, Harry wondered if it was all a huge joke on the part of the goblins, some twisted humor that a human wouldn’t understand, and if this was going to kill him. At least if it killed him, the pain would stop. As the chanting from the foot of the altar got louder, almost a shout now, Harry mercifully dropped unconscious.

Xoxoxoxoxox

He didn’t hurt.

He thought he should hurt, why didn’t he hurt?

He actually felt pretty good. He was laying on something soft, with something else soft covering him up to mid chest. He could feel this soft fabric under his hands, which were on top of the thing covering his body. Harry twitched his hands, then his feet, then flexed his legs and arms. This was a familiar routine, one he would follow the morning after he lost a game of Harry Hunting to see how bad the damage his cousin and his friends had done. But this time he didn’t have any pain, any stiffness, or any issues at all really. He actually felt better than he could ever remember feeling, other than still being tired even though he just woke up. Then a low hoot sounded in the previously silent room, there was a dip in the soft thing Harry’s head was laying on, and Harry felt a beak nibble at the hair around his left ear.

“Hedwig!” Harry forced his eyes open, only to close them quickly as the light, dim though it was, burned. He did lift his left hand off the cover, slowly since he couldn’t see and it felt like his arm weighed a ton, and reached toward where he thought his owl would be. He soon felt her feathered head butt up under his hand. “Hedwig, how did you get here? Where is here?” Hedwig hooted softly in response, then pulled herself back away. Harry felt a minor tremor in whatever it was he was laying on and thought that Hedwig must have taken flight. Harry tried to open his eyes again, but decided that was a bad idea. Even that small effort, and the moving of his arm, left him exhausted, and with question after question swirling in his head, Harry fell back unconscious.

Xoxoxoxoxox

There was a soft murmur of voices speaking a language Harry didn’t understand the next time he came back aware. He thought it sounded like what that healer goblin chanted…HEALER! ALTAR! PAIN!

Harry’s drowsing mind came to full alertness as the memory of pain and fire came back. He opened his eyes, but realized he had some sort of cloth covering the upper part of his head. He reach up to pull it away, only to have his wrist caught by someone.

“I would not recommend that, young Lord. The healing was successful, but left you very weak. And until your eyes adjust to the changes they will be very sensitive to any amount of light. Leave the cover for now.”

“Hea…” Harry’s attempt to speak trailed off into a hacking cough, his throat dry and his mouth gummy. His arm was let go, and he felt a hand push beneath his neck to help lift his head up slightly. “Drink, young Lord. Just a few sips to start.”

Harry felt a cup placed to his lips, and as he opened his mouth a cool faintly citrus tasting liquid drizzled inside. Swallowing what he was given, Harry felt his mouth and throat ease. The cup was taken back away, and Harry tried once again to speak. “Healing?!?! That was healing? That hurt worse than anything I’ve ever felt before. I thought was going to die.”

“You were very ill. You were deficient in several required nutrients to the point you were bordering on organ failure, had previously broken bones that had not been properly set, poorly healed scars that were impacting your muscle development, your magical core was **bound** , and there was a parasite piece of soul attached to your own leeching off of your magic and strength. It is a wonder you could move around on your own at all.” The goblin’s voice was scathing as it recited the list of problems. “You might well have died on your own without the ritual healing we completed.”

“Why…What made the Director ask me to be healed. Why lie to me about it and tell me I just needed vaccines? How did Ragnok know I needed healing, when I didn’t know?” Harry didn’t want to whine, but he was trying to understand what was going on and things were happening so fast, and changing so much, he was beyond frustrated. He wanted to get answers, but everything that happened was just raising more questions. “And where is here, and how did Hedwig get here?”

“I’ll give Lord Potter his answers, Rathgrow,” came the Director’s voice. “Dismissed.”

“Good evening, Lord Potter. To answer your questions, I didn’t know how bad your injuries were, but the way you moved indicated you were concerned about being attacked. No human your age moves like that unless they were specifically trained for it, which is very rare among humans, or if they have been subject to habitual abuse, which is unfortunately very common among humans. Particularly for magical children raised by non-magical adults. I wanted a scan of your body to determine if there were injuries we could use to contest your placement with your mother’s sibling because I suspected you had been abused there. The healer uncovered substantially more significant damage than expected, as well as the binding on your magical core and the soul leech. The binding and leech both fought the scan, which is what caused the pain you experienced. As for where you are, you are still at Gringotts. Once the healer had the results of the scan and started to assemble a team to complete the healing you required, I used the list of injuries to … convince your relatives to give me your things. You will not be going back to that place or those people.”

“That pain wasn’t the healing? That was just the scan? You went to Aunt Petunia and came back already? I’m not living there anymore? Where will I stay? How long have I been here?” The confused babble of questions poured out of Harry like a waterfall. Nothing connected in his head, everything he was told just raised more and more questions. He had never felt more like a child than he did right then. Harry had always had to look out for himself, and was expected to be very independent by his Aunt and Uncle so he grew up quickly and could never relate to anyone his own age (if anyone his age would even try to get close after Dudley and the gang were done). But now he was totally out of his experience, tired, frustrated, and confused. He wondered briefly if it would have been better had the healing killed him, at least then the shocks would be over.

“Lord Potter, I realize this has been a very unusual experience for you. You are a guest of Gringotts at the moment, and can stay here until it is time to leave for Hogwarts. While I am loath to let you go back under the dubious oversight of Dumbledore, you must learn human magic before facing Voldemort once more…”

“Facing Voldemort… I though he was dead. That I killed him when I was a baby. That’s why they call me that name, why all those wizards know me…How can I face him again?”

“Lord Potter, it is true that you destroyed his physical form that night. But there are prophecies that make it very clear he did not truly pass from this world when his body was killed. The healers believe the soul leech they purged from you was a part of that abomination …”

“What - a soul leech – I had a part of Voldemort in me!?!?!?” Harry burst out, overwhelmed by what he was hearing.

“Yes, that is what the healers believe. It has been removed and banished, and will not trouble you again. It is inconceivable that Dumbledore did not realize what had happened, particularly when your scar refused to heal. I believe that is one of the reasons he bound your magic. But again, we have no proof that you were scanned, or that Dumbledore is the one that bound your magic. There are unlikely to be any records concerning anything that he did with you right after that Halloween; he knows better than to leave a paper trail. If we try to accuse him, he is likely to protest that your parents must have bound your magic to reduce outbursts of accidental magic, which has been known to happen in the past though I cannot conceive of either James or Lily Potter even contemplating such a thing for their child. He will deny giving you a magical scan - though how anyone would believe he would not do a scan on the only being ever known to survive a killing curse I cannot imagine, but they would believe him because he is Dumbledore. At any rate, I believe Dumbledore scanned you when you were brought to him after that night, realized the soul leech existed, and bound your magic to keep both you and it weak. He likely hoped you would die while in the non-magical world, and almost certainly has paperwork gifting him with the Potter estate should the line end. Our healers removed the bind, removed the leech, and have healed most of the injuries you have suffered over the years. Your eyesight has been corrected, hence the cloth on your eyes while they finished adjusting, and you were fed several potions to correct the nutritional shortages you have experienced. The organ damage has been addressed, and the previously broken bones were re-broken and set properly this time. You need to rest to recover from the stress of your healing, but I expect you to be fully functional by the end of next week when it is time to board the Hogwarts Express.”

“Next week? It was a month until Sept first when I came to see you.”

“Yes, well, your healing was very strenuous. You have been unconscious for just over two weeks. You will need to start getting out of bed regularly and teaching your body to move around again. You don’t want to all the healing to go to waste. I have arranged for Sharptooth to work with you. He will have you moving around again very quickly.”

“Two weeks… I didn’t think Sharptooth was a healer. He…”

“Sharptooth isn’t a healer. Sharptooth is a warrior. He won’t heal you. He’s going to train you in the goblin way of fighting, at least as much as you can learn in two weeks right after being healed from life threatening injuries. You should be honored. Sharptooth rarely accepts individuals to train, rarely a goblin and never before a human. You must have impressed him.”

“Train…”

With that thought, Harry gave up the battle to stay awake he had been fighting ever since waking up. His last conscious thought as he fell back asleep was to think once again that maybe it would have been better to die on that altar, because he was certain Sharptooth was going to kill him before he left for Hogwarts.


	6. Chapter Five

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry takes the train, and meets some of the other children going to Hogwarts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Still don't own, and I'm not making any money off of JK Rowlings creation. I did take some of her dialogue and paraphrase it because it just fit so well, but it's a very short section of the chapter and I am acknowledging here that I did so.

Harry stepped through the barrier separating Platform Nine and Three Quarters from the muggle side of King’s Cross Station pushing a cart with his trunk and Hedwig’s cage strapped on. The goblins had arranged for him to arrive early in hopes of avoiding whatever machinations Dumbledore had planned. They didn’t know for certain there were any such plans, but with Hagrid not remembering to tell Harry how to get onto the platform, just giving him a ticket and a clap on the back, Director Ragnok thought it was likely. Ragnok figured that Dumbledore would have arranged for one or more of his supporters to watch for the boy, offer to ‘help’ him get to the train, and use that reinforce the whole ‘Dumbledore is the greatest wizard ever’ image that Hagrid had gone on about. Well, Harry thought of it as the ‘greatest wizard ever’ image. Ragnok had other words for it. Words that Harry didn’t even want to think about, and would certainly not say out loud. Ragnok **really** didn’t like the Headmaster.

At a glance, or even a long look, Harry still looked like the boy Hagrid had taken through Diagon Alley. A closer examination might show that the glasses he wore were plain glass, and the clothes he wore, though still somewhat large for his frame, fit better and were less worn than the set he had been wearing on his first trip to the magical world. A very observant person might realize he was an inch or so taller than he had been a month ago, and his face was somewhat more filled out. Harry was well aware that it was no longer possible to count his ribs by sight alone, and his spine no longer looked like it might poke out of the skin on his back. Overall, Harry was in much better physical shape then he could ever remember being. And he had strict instructions on food choices from the Healer, and on an exercise program from Sharptooth, both designed to keep it that way.

Over the past two weeks the Director had spent a few hours here and there with Harry, finishing translating the treaty and finally getting Harry’s signature on a short addendum reinstating it. He had also talked Harry through understanding his holdings – the trust vault, the main money vault, and the three (THREE?!?) vaults of heirlooms and various magical artifacts. He wasn’t allowed to just take anything out of any vault but his trust vault for now, but the Director had arranged for a goblin named Griphook to take him down to the different vaults so he could look around. He had met some of his ancestors – magical paintings could MOVE and TALK – and he had a better understanding now of the weight of history behind him. Harry thought it was interesting that his family had separated everything by magical affinity. One vault held items and portraits that were Light dedicated, one vault had the ones that were Dark dedicated, and the third held everything else, all the Neutral items. Ragnok had also explained that being Dark was not in and of itself a bad thing, it was more likely that those who were Dark aligned or used mostly Dark magic would be evil, but it was not a certainty at all. Just as those who were Light aligned or used mostly Light magic would not always be good. And Ragnok used Dumbledore as his main example. That goblin really didn’t like Dumbledore.

Of course, these meetings and visits to his vaults all had to take place in the few precious hours he wasn’t being run ragged by Sharptooth. That goblin hadn’t actually killed Harry, but it certainly had felt like it had tried. Between the running, jumping, spinning, and dodging (which is NOT the same thing as running in a straight line thank you very much), not to mention all the practice swinging different weapons, Harry had barely been able to stay awake during the talks with Ragnok. And the three visits to his various item vaults had been pretty short as a result as well. But Ragnok had promised that he could come back the next summer and have loads of time to explore each one. They had decided (meaning Ragnok had explained, and Harry had reluctantly agreed) that it would be too dangerous for Harry to try to come back during the winter break – Dumbledore was certainly aware of how Harry’s family treated him, and it would look odd if Harry choose to return when he had the option to stay at the castle. Of course, Harry had to manage to get through the school year first before he could return and keep exploring his vaults.

Ragnok had permitted him to remove one thing from the heirloom vaults, and that was his father’s second school trunk. Actually that wasn’t entirely correct. Ragnok had pretty much ordered him to take it. Goblin artificers had taken the trunk Harry had bought while with Hagrid apart and used the material to cover his dad’s trunk. The original trunk Harry had bought, and for that matter the original trunk his dad had bought which was also in storage in one of the vaults, were both basic student issue trunks. But his dad, at some point during his schooling, had decided the basic trunk was not enough. Ragnok didn’t know a whole lot about his dad personally, and didn’t know why he had wanted the upgraded trunk when most of the students were fine with the basic trunk with space expanding charms making the interior hold three times as much as the exterior looked like it should, but when Harry had mentioned finding two different trunks with his dad’s initials on his visit to the Light heirloom vault, Ragnok thought it odd enough to investigate. And when the details of just how the second trunk was modified were discovered, Ragnok decided that since Harry’s school tuition was paid out of the main vault and not his trust vault, that made it okay to take the trunk out of the heirloom vault since it was also going to be used for school. The fact that it had four different interior compartments, including one big enough to use to keep up the physical training Sharptooth had started Harry on, one that was specifically designed for books (which looked like it still had all his dad’s school books and then some with plenty of room for more), and a third that looked like a mini potions lab complete with preserved ingredients was simply going to help Harry learn better. Of course, the additional fact that there were some pretty impressive wards on the trunk that made even finding out the extra compartments existed if you didn’t have the matching master key was also nice.

There were actually three keys that went with the trunk (thankfully taped to the top of the lid with tags showing which was which, since they looked exactly the same to the eye). One just opened the first compartment, which looked like a perfectly ordinary school trunk, exactly like the one Harry had bought on the Alley on his first shopping trip. The second key accessed that compartment, and by turning the key in the other direction, would also let someone access the library section. Only by using the master key could all four compartments be opened. And Ragnok and taken the trunk away at one point to have some cursebreakers take a look at it, and had come back very happy with the report that it took some fairly high level and uncommon scans to identify that the trunk had more than two compartments at all. A basic scan just showed the normal one, a mid-level commonly used scan only showed the two that the second key could access. It wasn’t until the cursebreakers who specialized in accessing ancient tombs threw everything they could think of at it that the existence of the third and fourth compartments came out. Harry didn’t know what his dad had used the really large compartment that you had to use a ladder to get down into for, but he was going to use it for weapons practice and exercising. He also REALLY didn’t want to know why there was a cage large enough for a human to walk into in the corner of that compartment, complete with chains. Nope, he didn’t want to know. Particularly since the trunk had come out of the Light aligned vault, so that should have meant that his dad wasn’t the kind of wizard to kidnap someone and hold them hostage. He still wondered why a trunk meant for school had such a feature, but decided that he wasn’t going to try to find out. Of course, since finding out meant asking questions about it, which meant admitting he had the trunk and that the trunk had all these extras, well, Harry didn’t want to know. At least not so badly that he would give up the knowledge about his really cool secret trunk.

Harry still wasn’t completely sold on the idea that Dumbledore was as bad as Ragnok thought he was, but he had to admit it was pretty odd that Harry had been met by the groundskeeper and not a teacher, which was supposed to be the normal method of introducing muggle raised students to Hogwarts. Ragnok thought that the Headmaster used the knowledge that Harry’s Aunt and Uncle did know about magic to get around that one. Harry thought the Headmaster might have just wanted to give Harry a connection to his parents, since Hagrid was the one who found him after his parents were killed. Ragnok had downright glared at Harry when he mentioned that idea. At any rate, Harry had agreed that since there was evidence that Voldemort was if not exactly alive, certainly not entirely dead either, keeping knowledge of Harry’s extra training and supplies a secret was a good idea. Which to Ragnok meant keeping to himself (or at least away from anyone Dumbledore might have instructed to meet him) while he got the train. Which led him to be standing on the platform at 9AM, a good two hours before the train was due to depart, and since there was no train there, clearly even before the train arrived for the students to board.

‘Great. Now what? There isn’t anywhere to sit – don’t train stations normally have benches or something for passengers to wait on? I could unload my trunk and sit on that, but it was a pain to get balanced properly so Hedwig’s cage could be strapped down too and not fall off.’

“Hello.”

Harry spun around from where he had been standing staring at the empty train tracks. “Hello?”

“Hi, my name is Justin Finch-Fletchley. I’m starting at Hogwarts this year. Do you mind moving forward a bit? Only you are standing right in front of the entrance, and with your trolley it’s a bit hard to get around you.”

“Sorry about that, I was just surprised when I came through and didn’t see the train, and I don’t see anywhere to sit down and wait for it.” Harry said as he pushed his trolley further up the platform. “My name is Harry Potter. I’m starting at Hogwarts too.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Harry. I’m not surprised that the train isn’t here yet, trains run on schedules and normally only arrive a few minutes before they are scheduled to depart again. I would imagine there should be a little more boarding time for this one since all the students will have their trunks and whatnot, but two hours would have been too much to ask for.”

“If you didn’t expect the train to be here yet, why are you here so early?”

“Oh, that’s because my Dad has to go to France for a business trip this morning, and his train leaves from St Pancras International station. Since King’s Cross and St Pancras stations share a tube stop, it made more sense for me to come along with him instead of Mother making a separate trip later. His train leaves at 9:30, so he brought me here and stayed with me long enough to make sure I got through the pillar onto my platform. By now he’s probably back to the tube station making his way to the station on the other side of Pancras road to catch his train to Paris.”

“Your dad’s not a wizard then?”

“No, neither Mother nor Father have magic. I was actually down for Eton you know, before the letter for Hogwarts came. Mother wasn’t keen on the idea of me going to a school she’d never heard of and that wasn’t going to be a name I could share or that would be instantly recognizable, but Father saw the sense in training me in a special ability that is very uncommon. He’s going to have tutors over the summer so I don’t fall too far behind in anything Hogwarts doesn’t cover, so I can still pass my A-Levels when the time comes. But if you didn’t realize the train wouldn’t be here, why are you here so early?” As Justin had talked, they had continued to push their trolleys down the platform to be out of the way of the soon to be arriving additional students. “Let’s stop here. It’s far enough down to be out of the way but it doesn’t look so far as to be behind the last train compartment when it arrives.”

“Okay. I’m here early because my Uncle had to come into the city for a meeting,” Harry made up on the spot. He didn’t want to talk about staying with the goblins, or about distrusting Dumbledore with anyone yet, and a business trip was a good reason for his Uncle to need to come to London, and a good reason why there wasn’t anyone with him. “He dropped me off in front of the station and took off.”

“Wow, that’s harsh. He didn’t even walk you inside the station? Have you ever even been to a rail station? And why didn’t your parents bring you? I mean I understand Mother not coming when Father had the trip planned anyway, and she doesn’t like London at all, says it’s too noisy and dirty, but for both your parents to foist you off on your uncle and not even bother doesn’t seem right,” Justin said indignantly.

Harry was heartened by the words and tone of his new acquaintance. He always knew the way his relatives had treated him was wrong – he could see it in other families – but thought maybe it was because he was a nephew and not a son. But finding out he was magical gave a different explanation, and now a total stranger was objecting to something that Vernon probably would have done (if his Uncle Vernon would have bothered to bring him to London at all, which was doubtful).

“My parents are dead. They were killed when I was only just a year old. I’ve lived with my Aunt and Uncle as long as I can remember.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know. I didn’t mean to make you feel bad. I’m sure your Mother and Father would have brought you down themselves if they … And I’m not making this any better. That was rude. I’m…”

“Justin, it’s fine. I appreciate that you don’t agree with Uncle Vernon just dumping me here. I don’t like them, and they don’t like me. And now I don’t need to see them until next summer, so it’s fine. At least finding out I’m magic lets me understand why they never liked me.”

“What, they knew you were magic? I thought non magic people couldn’t know, unless they were immediate family. Professor Sprout was really clear that my parents couldn’t say exactly where I was going or tell anyone else, even other family members, that I have magic.”

“I think the rules are different for people you live with. But that’s not why my Aunt at least knew about magic. My Mum was like you – she had magic but her family didn’t, and she got a letter and came to Hogwarts when she was eleven. So Aunt Petunia knew about it, because she was immediate family. So when Mum and Dad were killed, and I got put with her, she must have figured I was going to have magic because my Dad’s whole family were magic. But she never told me about it or anything. I was shocked when the letters started coming. She told me when they couldn’t keep it a secret any longer that she hoped they could have made me normal. She hates magic.”

“Wow. That is harsh. I’m surprise they let you come. Mother tried to talk Father out of it, like I said. But I can’t see her keeping it a secret earlier if they knew. I know that to my family it would have been so much easier to have an explanation for some of the weird things that happened.”

“Yeah, I know. I used to get punished when weird things happened, but they never told me why. And how was I supposed to know what I was doing, if they never told me about magic?” Some of Harry’s evenings, when he wasn’t with Ragnok or taking short trips to see his other vaults, had been spent with the Healer Rathgrow making sure his training with Sharptooth didn’t undo all the healing he had been put through. That goblin had also helped Harry to understand he wasn’t at fault for anything his so called family had done to him. He still tended to want to stand where he could see everyone in a room, and wasn’t about to talk about growing up in a cupboard, but he could talk about some of the other things they had done now without flinching. Healer Rathgrow had said it was its job to make sure Harry was fully healed, and that included making sure he didn’t have any funny ideas or beliefs in his head like thinking he was in any way to blame for his relatives’ treatment or that he had to be ashamed and hide what they had done. They were wrong, and Harry had the right to be upset about it. It was hard for Harry to wrap his head around sometimes, after a lifetime of hearing about how worthless he was and having everyone around him fall into line with what the Dursleys said about him, to know that there were people … beings in the world that didn’t think he was a waste of space that should have been drowned at birth, as Uncle Vernon’s sister had told him once during a visit.

“Yeah, that’s pretty mean, to punish you for something you didn’t know you were doing, without telling you how you were doing it. At least I never got… well, almost never got punished for the odd things that happened,” Justin said.

“Almost never?”

“Well, there was this one time that I really wanted a biscuit. But Mother didn’t want me to have any, because we were having company over and she wanted me to stay neat and clean, and not be full of sweets so I would eat dinner quietly instead of getting bored because I wasn’t hungry and fussing. This was few years ago. I know better now, of course,” he added quickly.

“Of course,” Harry agreed.

“So anyway, I was too short to reach the counter, but I really wanted these chocolate biscuits that cook had made, with this really cool icing. And the next thing I knew, the jar of biscuits was lying broken on the floor next to me and there were broken biscuit pieces all over the place. Mother threw a fit. I was covered in crumbs and smears of icing, the kitchen floor was a mess, and the cook was screaming her head off about evil spirits invading her area and making things move. It’s pretty funny to think back to now, but I was grounded for a month after that happened,” Justin concluded.

“That was pretty funny.” Harry thought he was doing well at having a normal conversation, and maybe making a friend.

Both boys looked toward the tracks then because they started hearing the whistle of an approaching train. And there off in the distance, but rapidly coming closer, was indeed a train. As it got closer, slowed down, and came to a stop at the platform, the boys could see it was marked as the Hogwarts Express.

“Come on, let’s find a place to sit down!”

Harry and Justin grabbed their respective trolleys and made for the nearest entrance. It was awkward to manhandle their trunks up the steps onto the train once they took them off the trolleys, but with Justin pushing from the platform and Harry up on the train pulling, they managed to get them where they need to go. Justin pushed the trolleys back away from the tracks so they wouldn’t be in the way for anyone else, and hopped back onto the train with Harry. They quickly dragged their trunks into the closest empty compartment, and helped each other put them up on the racks.

The two boys continued to talk and share some stories of accidental magic as the train slowly filled. A pair of twins named Parvati and Padma Patil joined them, as did a boy named Ernie MacMillan. Padma and Parvati looked a little startled when Harry told them his name, and Ernie just sort of stared at him for a moment, but none of them said anything or had the sort of reaction that Harry remembered from the Leaky Cauldron. Sitting waiting for the trip to start, all of the children continued to talk and just get to know one another. Sometime later a whistle blew, announcing the impending departure of the train, and Justin started laughing and pointing out the window, causing the others in the compartment to crowd around to see.

Racing through the crowd of parents seeing off their children was an entire tribe of red headed children. Dragging trunks or pushing trolleys, the various boys (and one girl), pushed through the adults to get onto the train before it left. One of them must have bumped one of the waiting parents pretty hard, because what Justin was laughing at was a woman on her back with her legs just coming down from being up in the air, her skirt flared out on the ground around her. Behind the crowd was an older woman, also with red hair, yelling at the children to slow down before they hurt themselves or someone else. Harry noticed that the girl redhead didn’t have a trunk, and was stopping well before the train. She looked pretty young, so Harry thought she must not be old enough for Hogwarts yet.

“Talk about leaving it to the last minute!” Justin said, shaking his head in disbelief. “With that many children, you would think they’d get here early, not run in at the last minute.”

“Some people just can’t plan well.”

“It’s not nice to laugh – that poor woman might be hurt!”

“I’m glad that’s not my mother, how embarrassing is that?”

As the other occupants of the compartment made their comments, Harry thought this family must be the Weasleys. Ragnok had mentioned them as one of the families that seemed particularly taken with Dumbledore, something that might be helped by the fact that Dumbledore got them reduced tuition at Hogwarts so they could afford to send all of their seven children. The oldest child had graduated two years ago and was in fact working for Gringotts, though not in Britain. This oldest son, William, had actually specifically requested a posting away from England on his initial application to the bank, which led the Director to think he possibly might be trying to get away from Dumbledore, or at least his family. Harry wondered if they were so late because they were looking for him on the muggle side of the platform.

Just then the train began to move with a jerk, and everyone in the compartment sat back down on their benches. The conversation moved back to what classes they were looking forward to, and what they thought the sorting might be like. Several books Padma had mentioned the sorting, and described the different houses. Harry had also learned a fair amount about the various houses from the goblins and the books left in his Dad’s old school trunk, but nothing either of them had read described exactly how the sorting took place. A short time later, the door to the compartment opened.

“Hey, can I stay in here? Everywhere else is full up.” It was one of the redheaded children that had almost missed the train.

“Sure, there’s still room. Put up your trunk and grab a seat. We’re just talking about the sorting, and what houses we think might like. I’m Ernie MacMillan.”

“My brother told me we have to fight a troll. But he might have been pulling one on,” said the redhead as he lifted his trunk into the overhead rack. “And I’m Ron Weasley.”

“Nice to meet you, Ron,” Ernie looked around the compartment at the others with a raised eyebrow, clearly expecting them to now also introduce themselves.

“Hello, Ron. I’m Justin Finch-Fletchley.”

“Hello, my name is Padma Patil.” “Parvati Patil,” said the twins next.

“I’m Harry Potter.”

Ron’s eyes went wide, then flew to look at Harry’s forehead. “Harry Potter? Do you have, you know, the scar? Can I see?” Ron gestured towards Harry’s head.

Before Harry could respond another voice rang out. “That’s not rude at ALL, really,” said Padma sarcastically. “I mean, why would you even think that it’s okay to ask something like that?”

“Well, considering all of them were late enough they nearly missed the train, and one of them knocked down that woman without even stopping to make sure she was okay, I don’t think he would have learned much about manners from his family, since it looks like none of them have any,” added Justin.

His face growing to be the same color as his hair, Ron stood there, his mouth opening and closing but nothing coming out. Harry figured he’d better say something before Ron found his voice. So he looked around the compartment and said, “It’s fine, guys. Thanks for the support.” Turning to Ron he added, “Yes, I have the scar; no, I’m not going to show it to you. Sit down if you’re staying, or grab your trunk and leave, but don’t just stand in the doorway. That makes it hard for anyone to go use the loo.”

Still speechless, Ron stepped to the side and sat down with a thump on the edge of the bench. This put him facing Ernie, who was just shaking his head and laughing quietly. Padma, who was sitting in the middle next to Harry, scooted further toward the window and Harry, clearly distancing herself from the newcomer. Harry didn’t like to feel crowded but didn’t want to say anything rude since Padma had supported him, moved all the way up against the wall in response. He was now almost hemmed into the corner he was sitting in, which was bad, and furthest away from the door and escape if any of the other kids decided to attack him. He didn’t think it was likely, but long experience with Dudley meant that he was not going to be comfortable until the train ride was over and he was back out in an area with more space around to run.

The group went back to talking and sharing little funny stories from their childhood. Ernie and the Patil sisters all came from long lines of witches and wizards, though the Patil family was reasonably new to living in England with both parents born in India and moving to England with their families when they were children. The sisters had been born and grown up in England, with only a few short visits to extended family in India over the years. Ron’s family were also all wizards and witches, except a second cousin who became an accountant that they didn’t talk about much. None of them had anything bad to say about Justin, who was the first magical child in his family, and Harry just didn’t talk much about his growing up.

A few hours into the ride there was a short knock on the door that was then opened without waiting for a response. Standing in the doorway was a blond boy with a haughty look on his face. Harry remembered him from his trip to Diagon Alley with Hagrid. “They say Harry Potter is in this compartment, is it true?”

‘How would they know? I was the first person on the train, and didn’t go out announcing myself. Why would anyone be saying I’m in here? I can understand being on the train; Ragnok explained that since I’m so famous a lot of attention would be paid to when I go to Hogwarts, and I was recognized while in the Leaky Cauldron with Hagrid, but how would anyone know what train compartment I’m in exactly?’ As that thought ran though Harry’s head, he stood up and turned to face the blond. “I’m Harry Potter.”

“My name is Draco, Draco Malfoy.” Ron snickered at that, and Draco turned to him and sneered. “Think my name is funny then? No mistaking who you are, my father always said all the Weasleys have red hair, freckles, and more children than they can afford,” turning back to Harry he continued, “You want to make friends with the right sort. I can help you with that,” and he stuck out his hand for Harry to shake.

Harry didn’t appreciate Draco’s attitude or words, but with Ragnok’s advice about not purposely making enemies running in his head, he took Draco’s hand and shook. “I can make my own friends, and I don’t believe in there being a right and wrong sort without getting to know someone, but I’d be happy to get to know you and possibly be friends with you as well. Just don’t ask me not to be friends with anyone else. I’ll make up my own mind, and everyone here has been perfectly nice during the ride.”

Draco looked around at the others in the compartment, and gave a short nod to Ernie, who he seemed to recognize. He shook his head at the girls, and raised his eyebrow at Justin, then looked back to Harry. “Well, I can’t say much for your current choice of companions, and I certainly won’t be found hanging around anywhere a Weasley is, but if you change your mind I am sure you will able to find me.” With that, Draco turned around and left, pushing through the two large boys who had been waiting in the corridor during the entire interaction.

“What a git,” said Ron.

“Well, you did sort of laugh when you heard his name. That wasn’t very nice either, you know,” said Parvati, causing Ron’s face to turn red once again.

“Look, let’s just forget about Draco Malfoy. I want to hear more about Quidditch,” said Harry, trying to defuse the situation.

Instantly the other boys in the compartment were diverted into talking about the main wizarding sport. Even Parvati contributed to the discussion, though most of her comments were more on the players’ personal lives and who they were dating. Padma just shook her head with a long suffering look on her face, pulled a book out of her pocket and started reading. This state of things held until the train reached the Hogsmeade station.


	7. The Sorting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry makes it to the castle at last, and the other first years find out a bit more about his life before Hogwarts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> With all due respect to JK Rowling, this is her world I am just playing in it. If you recognize something, I don't own it. 
> 
> This chapter is a little shorter than what I am aiming for, but it was fighting me the whole way. I tried to write Hagrid's accent, and gave up in disgust so that section got rewritten a few times before I just went with standard English. And I do try to keep it sounding British, but I am American and I am sure I do not always succeed. And I am not happy with the sorting hat conversation, but I have to work tomorrow and I want to get this out before going to bed so I am posting it as it stands. I might go back and revise it later, though, because I am not happy with it.

“First Years! First Years over here,” came the loud, booming voice over the din of the children getting off the train. “First Years over here!”

“Blimey, he’s tall,” said Ron, finding Hagrid’s unmistakable form over the crowd.

“That’s Hagrid, the Hogwarts Keeper of the Keys. If that title means he controls access to the castle, which seems likely, then it makes sense for him to be the ones to gather the new students,” commented Harry as the group of First Years made their way over to the large man.

“How do you know who he is, I thought you said you grew up in the muggle world like me?” Justin asked.

“Oh, he was the one that brought me my letter, after my relatives kept destroying them as they arrived. He introduced himself then. He also took me to Diagon Alley to get all my stuff.” Harry replied.

“Wait a minute, Professor Sprout, the Herbology teacher brought me my letter. My one, single, original letter. You just got letters sent to you? And more than one?” Justin asked, with a confused look on his face.

“Well sure, Harry Potter didn’t need no teacher coming to explain things! He’s Harry Potter! All my brothers and me just got their letters by owl, just like any other letter. I guess a professor brought your letter because your muggleborn. But no wizard child needs a professor to bring his letter,” said Ron in a tone that heavily implied Justin was a little slow. His words rang out over the crowd, attracting attention from many of the children flowing down the path toward Hagrid.

“Ron, I grew up in the muggle world. My Hogwarts letter and Hagrid were my first introduction to the magical world. I had no idea I was a wizard until he showed up.” Harry said softly, but firmly.

“WHAT!?!?” came the startled cry from several throats around them.

“You didn’t know?”

“Hagrid was your introduction?”

“You grew up with muggles?”

While Harry’s comment to Ron had been spoken in a quiet tone, the exclamations from Ernie and the Patil twins were anything but, and the other children that were walking down and gathering around Hagrid started to slow, or turn back to the commotion.

“Well, that explains why you don’t know who the right sort are, at any rate,” came Draco’s smooth drawl from behind them. “Really, Potter, now I understand why you defended that oaf last month, if he was the person who brought you back into the wizard world. But he’s hardly a proper wizard, now is he?”

The rest of the first years bunched closer and the ones that had been close enough to hear the initial exchange passed word back that Harry Potter hadn’t known he was a wizard growing up. The muggleborns among the crowd grew more confused as every single magical raised child repeated the knowledge to those further back with clear disbelief in their tone. The muggleborn children on the other hand stood in silence, most of them not recognizing Harry’s name, and having no idea why so much fuss was being made over this one person. Several of them who had been in front continued to move toward Hagrid, who stood at the top of the path to the lake still waving his lantern and calling for the first years, but for those further back the way was now blocked by the knot of children that had come to a standstill around Harry.

“Here now, First Years this way, don’t want to hold up the feast do you?” came Hagrid’s booming voice. “This way, this way, and no more than four to a boat”.

Harry looked at Draco standing near him, but looking toward Hagrid with a sneer on his lips. “Hagrid is a kind man, which is something to be proud of, not looked down on. I don’t know if he is a proper wizard or not, but I count him as a friend. I’m pretty sure I remember telling you earlier that I won’t let you tell me who I can and cannot be friends with.” Harry’s voice was even, something that Sharptooth had worked with him on (in between the running, dodging etc). Words, tone of voice, the way you looked at someone, all could be weapons – and turned against you if you weren’t careful. Harry wasn’t perfect at holding in his emotions but his experiences with the Dursleys had given him solid practice at it. Sharptooth’s lessons were less about actually keeping a blank face (though it said Harry should continue to practice and learn to show nothing in all circumstances) and more about how such things could be used to one’s advantage or disadvantage, such as showing emotions that were different from what you were actually feeling, and how showing too clearly on your face what you were really feeling could lose you a fight before it even started.

Draco turned to face Harry, with surprise clearly showing on his face. This was someone who hadn’t yet learned the value of hiding what you felt. “You think of that cretin as a friend? He doesn’t even carry a wand! He’s not a proper wizard. You need to be seen with proper wizards, especially since you were raised by muggles. You are not doing yourself any favors calling people like that friends. He can’t do anything for you, you know.” The two large children standing to either side of the blond nodded firmly, but said nothing.

“I don’t look for or value friends by what they can do for me. If that is the only thing you look for in a friend, then I think you need to look elsewhere. I want to meet different people, and I want to get to know the world my parents came from…”

“Well, that your father came from at least…” came a whispered snigger from the crowd.

“The world my **parents** came from, both my parents were magical, and that is the world I want to get to know,” Harry said, his voice rising above the whispers from the group still gathered in a clump on the path. “Learning more about this world and what I am capable of is what I came to Hogwarts for. Not to make decisions about people without getting to know them first. Not to refuse to talk to someone because someone else thinks that is the right thing to do. If I decide not to be friends with someone it will be because I made the choice. Not because someone else made it for me.”

“Here now,” came Hagrid’s voice again, much closer as he moved back up the path to see what the problem was. “Come along, down to the lake, no more than four to a boat. Move along, down the path, come on now.”

Draco looked at Harry a moment longer as the group started to break up around them and the rest of the children started to flow down the path once again. His face now sported a puzzled look, but he stayed silent. After a short bit he nodded at Harry, and gave a short sharp jerk of his head at the two large boys who had flanked him through the entire conversation. The three of them started moving toward the lake with the rest of the crowd. With a shake of his head, Harry followed.

“Wow mate, you sure told him!” came Ron’s voice from beside him as he started to move. “He’ll be a slimy snake for sure!” Harry stopped once again, and shook his head.

“Snakes aren’t slimy,” he said flatly.

“Wha…”

“Snakes aren’t slimy, Ron. They are actually almost always completely dry to the touch because they tend to lay out in the sun a lot.”

“Why would you know that? You go around touching snakes a lot?”

“I did the gardening at my Aunt’s house. I had to move snakes out of the way of the mower or risk running them over. They aren’t slimy at all.”

“Gross!”

“Let’s just move along. I don’t know about you two, but I’m getting hungry, and standing here isn’t getting us any closer to the opening feast,” commented Ernie, who had been standing to the side taking it all in.

“WE’RE MISSING THE FEAST!” with an anguished shout, Ron took off running toward the boats.

“Well, he certainly has his priorities down,” said Justin with a straight face. Harry just rolled his eyes and started down the path himself. By this time, Harry, Justin and Ernie were the last ones in line, and they got into the final boat together with a dark haired girl who introduced herself as Lisa Turpin.

The sight of the castle was brilliant as they rounded the curve of the lake, and Harry certainly understood why tradition had the first years enter the castle this way. The boats floated serenely toward the cliff the castle stood upon, and into an opening that led to an underground harbor. Waiting was an older witch, with her own lantern. “The first years, Professor,” said Hagrid.

“Yes, thank you. I’ll take them from here.”

The group was led up stone stairs into a small room. “Wait here until we call you for sorting. It won’t be long.”

Whispering broke out – many of the children still staring at Harry. Others were looking around between the different groups and Harry, with puzzled looks on their faces. Still others were questioning what the sorting would be like, and Ron’s voice could be heard talking once again about wrestling a troll.

After a short while, and an introduction to some of the castle ghosts, the stern looking older witch returned. “This way, please. Line up and follow.” She led the way into a large hall, filled with tables and rows of children. The ceiling above mimicked the starry sky outside and hundreds of candles floated in the air. They trooped forward to the front of the hall where a stool sat, with a very battered looking hat sitting on top. As the first years came to a halt, the brim of the hat opened like a mouth, and a song about the different houses and their various traits came out. Once it was finished, the professor resumed speaking. “Line up then, and when you hear your name step forward, take a seat on the stool and put the Sorting Hat on your head.”

“Abbott, Hannah!”

Harry stood watching the sorting, and wondered where he would best fit. Talking to the goblin healer and helped him get a better idea on who he was, but Harry knew there was a lot more he needed to get straight before he fully came to terms with his upbringing, and the revelations of his place in the wizarding world. He knew his parents had been Gryffindors, but the Director (and for that matter most of the goblins Harry had interacted with) didn’t seem to like Godric Gryffindor very much. Harry knew there had been a fight between Godric and his ancestor Salazar sometime after the school was founded, but didn’t think that was why the goblins didn’t like Gryffindor. Harry also knew that the wizard that had murdered his parents, and that he was prophesied to fight was a Slytherin – supposedly the Heir of Slytherin, which didn’t make sense if the goblins were calling Harry the Heir, but the Director hadn’t explained that part fully during their talks. But while Harry might be entitled to be called Lord Slytherin, he didn’t think he wanted to be part of that house. And as the sorting when on and first the two bookends and then the annoying blond that reminded Harry of his cousin all went into Slytherin, Harry was certain he didn’t want to go there. The last thing he wanted was to spend the next seven years with that boy as his ‘family’, in Professor McGonagall’s words. Finally, his name was called. “Potter, Harry!”

The rest of the hall broke out in whispers that was worse than the furor on the train, worse than the rest of the first years on the path to the lake, even worse than what Harry remembered from his first trip to the Alley with Hagrid. ‘Don’t they have anything better to talk about than me? I’ve been gone for 10 years, why do they even still care? It’s annoying.’ With that running through his head, Harry took his seat on the stool and let the Sorting Hat fall down around his head.

“Hm, well, this is interesting”

‘What, who, what?’

“I’m the Sorting Hat, of course. How am I supposed to sort you if I can’t see into your head?”

‘That’s it, I’ve lost it. I’m officially insane’

“Don’t be silly, dear boy.”

‘Only crazy people hear voices in their heads. I can hear you in my head, so I’m crazy,’ thought Harry.

“Nonsense. Muggles who hear voices are crazy. Wizards have any number of ways to hear voices in their heads without losing sanity. I am merely the most consistent way, one that every child that passes through these doors experiences. Now calm down so I can see where to Sort you. Hm. You have a fine mind, but not the love of learning that marks a true Raven. Brave, yes, you could fit in the Lion’s house. But you don’t like the thought? Why? Goblins?!? You’ve already signed an alliance treaty with goblins before you even get to school! Such ambition is truly worthy of Slytherin…”

‘NOT SLYTHERIN!’ Harry thought as loudly as he could.

“You want to be great, to change the world, Slytherin would help you with that,” the Hat responded.

‘NOT SLYTHERIN. I’d slit my throat if I had to be Malfoy’s family, or maybe his throat. Probably his.’

“Ha, ha, ha, ha. Yes, I suppose you would. Quite upset with him for insulting your friend Hagrid, now aren’t you. Loyal to your friends, I see. Brave, but not for Gryffindor I see. No, no one who spends time with and listens much to the goblins comes out with a high opinion of the House of the Lion. Better be…HUFFLEPUFF!” the last word shouted for all the Hall to hear.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am going to try to post the next chapter on Sat morning 11/1/14, but I am going on a trip out of town from the afternoon of 11/1 to the afternoon of 11/9 so the next two weekends are not guaranteed. I will try my best, but I have no idea what kind of internet access I will have, and I will have an iPad, not my desktop, and I cannot type anything of length on a tablet, so I cannot make promises.


	8. Interlude

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Headmaster reacts to Harry's sorting

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Do I live in a castle? I don't think so. Then still not mine.
> 
> I'm preparing for my trip, and then will be traveling, so I don't have much time to write this weekend. But here's a little bit before the next real chapter. I've started the next chapter, but doubt I'll get it posted this weekend. I'll try to work on it while I'm away so I can post it next weekend when I get back, but make no promises.

‘HUFFLEPUFF! How in Merlin’s balls did the brat develop enough loyalty toward anyone to be sorted into Hufflepuff? That won’t due at all! He could develop lots of friends there, sons and daughters of families that I don’t have influence over. He could become friends with the BONES child of all things. This is a disaster!’

The Headmaster did not let any of his thoughts show on his face as he watched the remainder of the students sorted into their houses, but inside he was fuming. His plans counted on a reckless Harry, with few friends, and a burning need to prove himself in the world his parents came from. A loyal Harry with strong ties to other children was NOT part of the plan. Not part of the plan at all. He would have to regroup.

The stone was in place, and the protections starting to come together. But he couldn’t count on Harry exploring that corridor and having a run in with the Cerberus. He wouldn’t have Gryffindor dorm mates talking about exploring the third floor corridor, and living in the bottom of the castle he was less likely to stumble across it by accident while learning the school as he traveled back and forth from the dorms. And Pomona was much closer to the children in her House than Minerva was. Getting Minerva to take on Head of House duties in addition to be being Deputy Headmistress and the Transfiguration teacher without dropping either of her other roles had been part of the plan to keep Harry isolated and without adults he could count on. Minerva was too trusting sometimes. She had a good heart, and had adored James Potter, but her duties meant she was always too busy to spend much time with her house. That would have been perfect. Pomona on the other hand actually held regularly scheduled House meetings, and made all of her House know they could come to her with any concerns. But he was Albus Dumbledore. He could adapt. Harry would have to be encouraged to spend time with Hagrid. The part giant could easily be led to talk about the right things. Like talking to the child about his parents. Harry would certainly be eager to learn more about the parents he couldn’t remember. And if Hagrid’s reminisces about Harry’s parents centered on his father and James’s reckless escapades, well it would make sense for a child eager to connect with his dead parents to want to emulate things his father had once done. That might lead the child to explore the Forbidden Forest. That could work, and if Harry could be guided into wandering into the forest in an effort to feel closer to his dead father, well then, maybe he would be able to get much closer. Such as joining James Potter in Death’s embrace.

“Zabini, Blaise!”

“Slytherin!”

‘Oh, the Sorting is over. Better start the feast.’ “Before we begin our banquet, I would like to say a few words. And here they are: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak! Thank you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Headmaster's spoken words at the end of this chapter are of course taken directly from JK Rowling's Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone.


	9. The Sett

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry learns a little more about the House he was sorted into.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am sooo sorry this took so long. Apparently visiting my mother sucks all the creative juices right out of me. But I had some time to sit with a friend at a Memorial Day party last week and talking about fanfiction and my writing encouraged me to try to pick it back up again. Here is the next chapter, and I hope to get back to a regular posting schedule again.
> 
> Also, still not mine.

The Feast was a confusing jumble of names, faces, and sound bites for Harry. Everyone at the Hufflepuff table was great and welcoming, and for the first time in his life Harry felt like he belonged somewhere. The goblins had been great, no question, but they were **goblins,** not human, and Harry just wasn’t ever going to think exactly like one of them did. At the Hufflepuff table, while a few of the students looked at him like he was this fantasy hero come to life, most of the children just smiled or waved and said hello and can you pass the potatoes down this way, please.

Meanwhile, most of the conversations at the other tables touched at least once on Harry Potter’s unexpected sorting. In the background Harry could hear his name mentioned more than once, but he determinedly ignored those conversations – they would think what they would think, and from living with the Dursleys Harry was convinced that there was no good in trying to change anyone’s opinion of anything, because no one would listen to him. The goblin healer had tried to address that matter too in their sessions, but there was so MUCH healing Harry had to do, and so many issues with self-esteem, intelligence, worthiness etc. and way too little time to cover anything in depth that most of the topics were really just mentioned with a list of things for Harry to reflect on while meditating at school, but no real healing having occurred.

Harry was mindful of those sessions with the healer when he filled his plate but it was overwhelming, as he got to choose what he ate and how much he ate for the first time in his life. At the Dursleys it was whatever was left, or his Aunt set aside as unfit for her real family to eat. At school it was a preset menu and portions. And with the goblins the healer had determined all of Harry’s meals, down to how much of each item Harry was required to eat. The selection of food, and the sheer amount available was mindboggling. Harry made sure to take some of the vegetables moving along the table, and to avoid the fried foods, but that still left a bewildering selection of items available. He thought he was probably eating too much, but two weeks with the goblins meant that he was starting to fill out, and probably wouldn’t get sick. And there was so many new dishes he’d never seen before! Aunt Petunia had some ‘special’ dishes she made for guests (not that Harry had ever had any), but for family it was pretty much roasts and potatoes, or chicken and potatoes, with mushy peas and the occasional shepherd’s pie. And Harry rarely got to have any meat since that was what Vernon and Dudley went the most for. Some scraps, and some leftover peas was the norm for Harry’s dinners. What the goblin healer called food might have been good for him, but he couldn’t tell what it really was and it didn’t taste of much of anything. But here! There were roasts, and savory pies, platters piled with fried chicken and all sorts of side dishes he’d never seen before. Harry wanted to try EVERYTHING. He took a small portion of just about everything he could see, until his plate was all but overflowing.

“Don’t stuff yourself too much on this stuff. The opening feast is one of the times the elves go wild with desserts, and they won’t get sent up for another 30 min or so,” said a light haired older student from a little ways down the table. “On a normal night there will be one or two cakes, a pudding, and maybe a pie. But tonight, like Halloween and the Leaving feast at the end of the year, we get one of everything the elves know how to make it seems like. They wait so students will have some real food, but you want to leave room.”

‘Desserts?’ Harry tried to remember if he’d ever really had dessert. There was that ice at the zoo of course, and he was able to sneak a taste sometimes from the mixing bowls when he cleaned up at home. The school wasn’t big on providing sweets with the free lunches, and when various mums had sent in treats for their kids’ birthdays, Dudley always managed to get Harry’s share. ‘Huh.’ Harry looked at his very full plate. ‘Maybe I’ll just taste a bite or two of what’s on my plate and not clean the whole thing.’ It seems a little wrong, since Aunt Petunia always said he should finish everything he was given because of starving children in Africa, but Healer Rathgrow was insistent that pretty much everything his Aunt said was to be ignored, and it wasn’t like Aunt Petunia made Dudley clean his plate. Granted, the baby whale normally all but licked his plate clean, but there were times when Aunt Petunia put more vegetables on the plate than Dudley was willing to eat and he never got yelled at for leaving them when he got up from the table. ‘That’s what I’ll do. I’ll try everything I took, but I won’t eat all of everything I took.’ With that decided, Harry dug in with a will.

Xoxoxoxox

‘Wow. That guy wasn’t kidding about the desserts. Desserts are brilliant!’ Thought Harry as he followed his classmates down toward where the Hufflepuff dorms were. ‘Chocolate and treacle and pudding. Now I understand why the healer was warning me about not too much sugar. Oops on that tonight, but I’ll do better tomorrow.’

“First years to the front, now.”

Harry looked around to see they were in some sort of alcove, with a wall at the back filled with large barrels. ‘What?!?!?!’

“Okay first years, pay attention. You have to pick the right barrel, and you have to knock in the right sequence, or you’ll get splashed with some nasty vinegar. Don’t share which barrel, or the code – which is Helga Hufflepuff. Don’t forget. You’ll want to make sure no one but Puffs are around when you are going to the dorms.”

‘Code? Knock on a barrel? Vinegar if you get it wrong? Wizards are weird.’ Harry watched while one of the identified prefects counted barrels over from the wall to make sure he was in the middle, and then knocked in a distinctive pattern. The end of the barrel melted away, similar to the entrance to Diagon Alley, revealing a tunnel. One of the other Prefects immediately darted into the opening and started crawling through. ‘Okay…’

“Right, don’t rush, but everyone head down and into the Sett. First years, there’s a house meeting the first night every year. If anyone needs the loo let the Prefect waiting at the bottom know and she’ll direct you where to go. Make sure to come right back to the main room for the meeting. Professor Sprout will be along very soon and it’s not right to make her wait.”

Harry made his way through the passage to a rather large round room with a fireplace, and lots of couches and soft looking chairs scattered around roughly in a bunch of half circles facing it. There were some tables with straight backed chairs along the walls, and several round exits leading elsewhere. There were several windows high up along the walls, many with different looking plants in pots along their sills. There were some plants scattered around the rest of the room, either on tables or for some of the larger plants, standing on the floor. There were also some hanging planters coming off the ceiling. ‘Wow, that’s a lot of plants. I hope students don’t have to make sure they are watered; I don’t see any ladders or way to get up there,’ thought Harry.

The older children were all moving toward the couches and chairs, and the first years were being urged to the front, closest to the fire. It didn’t seem like anyone needed to use the loo, and the children were quickly settled down. Six older children moved to the front, and Harry saw they were all wearing a prefect badge on their robes.

“Professor Sprout will be here soon. My name is Gabriel Truman, and I am the Male Seventh Year prefect. With me are my fellow prefects. Returning students will know Artemisia Stump, the other seventh year prefect and our sixth year prefects, Matthew Formby and Heather O’Malley. New to being prefects this year are William Burnside and Porsha Corner. First years, if you have a problem or a question come find any one of us and we will do our best to help you. That is for ALL problems or questions, not just relating to schoolwork. Your house is your home while you are here, and we are all family. Like family, we may squabble or argue amongst ourselves at times, but when one of us needs help we are there to provide that help.”

‘Family. My family never did anything to help me. I know that’s not how it’s supposed to be, but I don’t think I can think of other Hufflepuffs as family right now. If I do, I’m more likely to run away from them than to ask for help.’

“Professor Sprout!” Harry looked back up at the line of prefects to see a wide grin on most of their faces. The sixth year female prefect was the lone exception. Heather O’Malley looked annoyed, but her face quickly smoothed out and a small smile appeared. Harry wasn’t sure why the prefect wouldn’t be happy to see her head of house, but it wasn’t really his problem. He focused his attention on the rather short older woman who had moved to stand with the prefects. She had a large smile on her face and was dressed in dark brown robes.

“Good evening, children. It’s late, and it’s been a long day so I won’t talk long, but I did want to welcome you all to Hogwarts and Hufflepuff personally. We are often called the house of the duffers and leftovers, but we have a long history of outstanding graduates including several Ministers for Magic, a headmaster for Hogwarts, and more. Hufflepuffs are known for hard work and loyalty among other traits, and I would encourage all of you to develop study groups to support and help each other. I like to be involved with my students and you will find me here in the common room several times a month, and of course you can always look for me over in the greenhouses during the day if you have a free period; as long as I am not teaching a class I am happy to take time to speak with any of you. I also will be setting up meetings with each of my new students, so first years expect a note giving you a day and time when I give you your schedule in the morning. My normal office is over in Greenhouse One, so all students can find me easily. Do not attempt to enter any of the other Greenhouses on your own; all of them except for One have plants you have not been taught to deal with. But the meetings will be held in one of the quiet study rooms down here so you are not wandering the grounds in the evening.” Professor Sprout motioned toward a round door in the wall that looked like every other round door scattered around the room. “Alright, I am sure you are all quite ready for bed. Girls’ dormitories are off through this door,” the Professor waved toward a door to the right of the fireplace, “and the boys’ dormitories are through this door.” This time the gesture was toward a door on the left side of the fireplace. "Your dorm room will be marked by your year on the door and the house elves would have already delivered your trunks. Off you go, you need to get a good night’s sleep to be ready for the start of classes tomorrow. Good night!” With that, the Professor made her way back toward the entrance of the common room, leaving the students to get themselves up out of the soft furniture and into their respective dorms rooms. Harry made his way over to the entrance to the boys’ dorms and waited for his turn to enter.

“We have to crawl in and out of our dorms? In robes? And carrying our book bags? We need to be hard working to put up with that every day.” Justin came up beside Harry shaking his head. “I like the idea of Hufflepuff house, and can get behind values like being hard-working and loyal, but Mother would have a fit if she knew.”

Harry laughed a little. “It’s odd, but seems to work. And this is a really nice room to hang out in. I bet it looks great during the day with sun coming in the windows.”

“True. Everyone I’ve talked to is really happy to be in Hufflepuff. That makes it nicer.”

As they talked the line to get into the dorms shrunk ahead of them until it was their turn. They crawled into the tunnel, only to have it open up enough that they could stand after only a few feet. William Burnside was waiting just past where the tunnel opened up. “Another two first years, yes?” he looked at a piece of paper. “Harry Potter and Justin Finch-Fletchley, right? You are the last two male first years. Your dorm is the first door on the right, and the shared bathrooms are at the end of the corridor. Breakfast starts in the Great Hall at 7AM, and you need to be there no later than 8AM to get your schedules. I will be waiting in the common room at 7:30 to take any first years who are not sure of the way back to the Great Hall. If you want a guide, don’t be late.” William gave a sharp nod, then turned and walked up the hall. Harry and Justin looked at each other, shrugged, and followed. As William passed right by what had to be their dorm room without stopping, Harry figured he was done with his explanations. Harry opened the specified door to show a decent sized room with three other boys already there. He knew Ernie from the train, but hadn’t had a chance to meet the other two boys yet as they hadn’t been near him at the table during the feast and none of the first years had really talked in the common room.

“Hi guys,” said Ernie as they entered. “We were just figuring out which bed we all were going to take.” The room was roughly round in shape, with beds spaced out pretty evenly along the wall. In between the beds were desks and small chests of drawers, clearly one of each for each bed in the room. The room had windows set high up in one wall, currently covered in black curtains with yellow edging. There was a small pile of trunks in the center of the room by a metal stove.

“I want one of the beds nearest the door,” said one of the boys Harry didn’t know yet. He was a tallish boy with blond hair and a sneer on his face. He rather reminded Harry of Draco Malfoy. ‘Great. I make sure I’m not with one stuck up ponce, but seem to be stuck with another one instead.’

“I don’t care which bed I end up with. They all look pretty much the same to me,” Harry said evenly. Each boy picked out his respective trunk and found a bed. After digging through his trunk, Harry changed into his night clothes and crawled into bed. He knew he should wash up a bit, but it had been a very long day, with lots of new things and new people and he was just too tired. With a last thought of ‘I don’t see an alarm clock to set anywhere,’ Harry dropped off into sleep.


	10. You've got questions? We don't have the answers.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry continues to ask questions. It would be nice if people could or would actually answer them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not mine. I'm not rich, I don't vacation in castles, I can't give enough money away to charities that it changes my standing on a list of the world's wealthiest people. Seriously, I read somewhere that J.K has given so much money to charities recently it knocked her off of some list down to another list for people who don't have as much money as those on the first list (from billionaire to millionaire maybe?) Whatever the specifics, it was a significant percentage of her net worth. How cool is that?

As the day of his scheduled meeting with Professor Sprout came closer, Harry tried to figure out what he could share, and what questions he should ask. He had no idea how closely tied to Dumbledore she was, and the goblins had been very clear that the Headmaster was not to be trusted at all, so Harry was going to follow their advice while he tried to judge for himself. But there were lots of questions the goblins just couldn’t answer, and Harry wanted those answers. He was still coming up with more questions every time he got one answered, and his notebook to keep track was more than a third full already. At this rate, he was going to need another one just to finish out the school year. And he wasn’t using it for any school questions! Or at least not questions about his school **work.** He had plenty of questions about why the school didn’t cover things like English and why there was no effort to make sure all the kids had the same basic knowledge. The professors were assigning essays for homework, and Harry didn’t know what that really meant other than dump some facts onto the parchment. He’d written short essays last year and understood he had to have an introduction, a body, and a conclusion or summary. But his previous assignments had never been more than one page, and related to the reading they were doing in English class. He’d never had writing assignments for homework in any of his former classes. Now it seemed that every teacher wanted essays and they had to go find the information to put in them. He never learned how to do THAT. But no one explained it! And why were all the first years effectively in classes together? Harry knew that was how the non-magical people did it, but from what Harry could see so far, the students were all over the place in terms of knowledge and talent. He wasn’t bored since all of this was new to him, but Harry could see that the kids from magical homes **were**. So why weren’t there extra classes or different classes for those who didn’t come from magic houses? Okay, maybe he did have school questions in his notebook.

“Have you finished the essay for Professor Snape yet, Harry?”

‘And I guess asking why Snape hates me counts a school question, technically.’ “Not yet, Justin.”

“It’s due Tuesday, that doesn’t give you much time. How far have you gotten?”

“Not very. I’m having a hard time finding information. I don’t recognize dittany the way I do asphodel, and while I found out the wiggentree is a magical Rowan, I’m dead sure Professor Snape wants more than that and he probably doesn’t care about what I know about the non-magic tree. The entries in our Herbology book aren’t very detailed.”

“Well, it’s a basic reference. Since it covers 1000 different plants, it doesn’t have much room to go into detail on any one of them,” Justin replied. “Have you asked any of the older students in the Common room for help? One of the prefects had a book a few nights ago that had a lot more information. I don’t remember the title, I just looked at it while I was sitting with her and took notes. Actually, you could look at my notes if you want, that should give you most of what you need.”

“That would be great, Justin. I’d really appreciate it. It’s really hard sometimes, and we’ve only been here a few weeks.”

“You know, if you did your homework out in the common room in the evenings, you’d probably not be so worried about things. There are lots of older students who stop by the table we all tend to use to offer advice and make minor corrections, even if none of us are looking for help.”

Harry didn’t know what to say to that. He actually tried to do a lot of his homework in the dorm room so he could use the extra books from his trunk without giving away that he had all these extra books, but he didn’t always know which book had the information he needed, and not all of the books had descriptive titles or indexes. He also tended to go to sleep really early, and that would be harder to hide if he was in the common room and had to stop studying or hanging out before 8PM every night. But in order to keep up with his exercise schedule his alarm went off at 4:30 every morning (and wasn’t that a shock the first morning to find out wizards used their wands as alarms when Ernie’s went off), which meant that Harry just couldn’t stay up any later as a regular thing. His trunk was great though. He could get up when his wand buzzed (from under his pillow, so it didn’t wake up the whole dorm), go into the large room like compartment in the trunk, do his exercises (being alternately mocked and screamed at by the portrait Sharptooth had found to give him feedback while he worked out – it was a good thing the trunk, or at least that compartment, had a permanent silencing charm on it), and come back out before his dorm mates woke up, and without anyone knowing what he was doing. And as a bonus, the portrait had another frame somewhere in the bank so Harry had a completely secure way of communicating with the goblins that Dumbledore couldn’t track or intercept. Harry didn’t know why the goblins thought Dumbledore would care about his mail, and didn’t actually think Hedwig would be in any danger going back and forth, but Ragnok had been very firm. Harry wasn’t to send ANY owls to the bank from Hogwarts – not Hedwig and not a school owl - and if the bank needed to send something to Harry (like more potions if the Healer thought it was necessary or Harry broke any of the supply Healer Rathgrow had added to his trunk when he was packing) they would make other arrangements so Harry wasn’t receiving owls directly from the bank either. But this wasn’t responding to Justin’s comment, and he was clearly waiting for some sort of reply, standing there looking at Harry with his head cocked to one side.

“I’m not really used to studying with anyone else around. I always did homework up in my room at my Aunt’s house, by myself. It’s just a habit, I guess,” Harry finally said.

“Well, you should try to study in the common room at least some of the time. Smith is starting to call you an arrogant git who thinks he’s above the rest of us, which is kinda funny coming from him considering that’s how he acts most of the time.”

Harry gave out a short laugh. “Yeah, Smith is pretty annoying. Why he thinks he should get his own way and priority because he’s descended from Helga Hufflepuff I’ll never understand. From everything everyone always says about her that is totally not like her and how she acted.”

“Very true.”

Xoxoxoxox

Harry knocked on the door to the quiet study room that his Head of House had been holding meetings in for the past few weeks. He tried not to think there was a reason to be suspicious that his meeting was both scheduled last, and was the only meeting scheduled that night. All the others had been two to a night. Now it was true that with only four girls in his year in Hufflepuff there was an uneven number of first years so someone was going to be by themselves, but Justin had been scheduled first, and when he came back he mentioned that it was because he was a muggle born and the Professor thought he might have questions. Well Justin didn’t tell Harry if he had had questions or not, but Harry had made a list out of his notebook that he felt were okay to ask and, the goblins had agreed according to the portrait in his trunk (that still hadn’t given Harry a real name. Harry was supposed to call him teacher or Master or Sir. Harry stuck with teacher.) Harry thought if Justin got to go first because he was muggle born, then Harry should have gone next because he was raised by muggles.

“Come in, dear,” came back the cheerful voice of Professor Sprout.

“Hello, Professor,” said Harry as he entered the room. A small study table was sitting not quite in the middle of the room, but not pushed all the way up against a wall either. There was a tea set and a plate of biscuits sitting on the table and his head of house was sitting in the chair facing him. The other chair was directly across from her, which meant that Harry would be sitting with his back to the door. Not something that he was happy about. “Professor, would you mind if I moved the chair to one of the other sides?”

“Of course not, Harry, whatever makes you comfortable. This is just a get to know you meeting. I think it’s important as your head of house to meet with you and make sure you are getting along alright.”

“Thank you, Professor.” Harry moved the chair and sat down where he could see both the Professor and the door to the room. He accepted a cup of tea and added a touch of cream and sugar. He liked tea with more – milky and sweet was the description of his true preference and one he had had only rarely back with the Dursleys – but Healer Sharptooth had told him to cut back while his body adjusted and the potions continued their work so Harry just took one lump and a small splash from the cream pitcher.

“Now that you’ve had a chance to settle in a bit, and started classes, what can you tell me is your favorite subject here at Hogwarts?”

Harry looked up blankly. ‘Favorite subject? Is she serious?’ “I like Transfiguration, Professor. I actually have some questions for you, if you don’t mind?”

“No, of course not. I just didn’t think you’d have any and wanted to start the conversation.”

Harry stared, his eyes a little wide. “Why would you think I wouldn’t have any questions? You had Justin in here first because you thought he’d have questions. Why would I be different?”

“Mr. Finch- Fletchley doesn’t come from a magical background, Mr. Potter, and”

“Professor, I’m sorry to butt in, but really, neither do I.”

Now it was Professor Sprout’s turn to stare. “What do you mean? Your parents were both magical.”

“But my Aunt and Uncle don’t have any magic. I had no idea I was a wizard until late this summer.”

The Professor stared some more. Her mouth opened and closed a few times, but nothing came out.

“So, my questions?”

“Oh, yes, please, what questions do you have?”

“Okay, so do you know where I can find information on the Potter family? Aunt Petunia really didn’t know him very well,” Harry wanted to be careful about how he worded things. He didn’t want to lie, but he wasn’t about to talk about his family with a stranger. It was bad enough as much as the goblins knew. It wasn’t anyone’s business but his. “All I know was that he went to Hogwarts the same time as my mum and Voldemort killed him.” There were a lot of books in his trunk beyond the basic school texts, but none of them were about his family or his history. No journals (because when a guy keeps a book of stuff about his life it is NOT called a diary) or anything of the sort was found. There might be something of that nature in one of his vaults, but since he was still a minor he wasn’t really supposed to be in those vaults. Ragnok had made the exception to let him see the vaults since he hadn’t known they existed when he arrived at the bank, and of course he got his trunk, but he wasn’t allowed to spend hours and hours poking around, and other than the trunk he wasn’t allowed to take anything out. And Harry didn’t want to say anything about the history the goblins had told him since he wasn’t supposed to let anyone know about the treaty yet, or that he was even working with the goblins. Harry noticed his teacher shudder when he said Voldemort’s name, same as Hagrid had when he asked about it on the first day he was introduced to the magical world. He really didn’t understand why it was such a big deal.

“Oh. Well. That’s, um. Well. The library doesn’t really have a lot of family history and whatnot. Children from magical families learn that information at home, from their parents…” Professor Sprout stopped, colored, and quickly picked up her tea cup. She took a deep breath. “I am not that familiar with the Potters; I taught your father when I took over as the Herbology professor while he attended Hogwarts but his parents were out of school well before I was a student, let alone teaching. The Headmaster might know more about your family; he has been at the school over 50 years as an instructor and headmaster and his work with the Ministry during the war could have had him interacting with your parents as well.”

“I don’t think I should bother the Headmaster with this. I just thought there might be those books on family history somewhere. I know I heard my aunt talking about finding out where the family came from once and there was this place that was supposed to have all these books of who was married to who and when they had kids and stuff.”

“Well, like I said, mostly that is kept in the families. The wizarding world doesn’t keep that information in a central place like what you are talking about. I will see what I can find out, and if you don’t want to bother the Headmaster, perhaps Professor McGonagall could at least tell you more about your father since she was his head of house while he was at school. I will let her know...”

“It’s okay, I can ask her after class one day,” said Harry quickly. He wanted more information, but he didn’t want it spread all around that he was asking questions. He thought that would be one of the easier ones but maybe not. “Why isn’t there a class or some sort of training on how to use the library to look up stuff? I remember my English teacher saying we were going to have research projects once we hit secondary school and there would be classes held in the library to show us how to do the research. But here, we’re given all this homework, and I never learned how libraries are set up or how to find stuff. And the same with writing. Professor Snape marked down my essay because he didn’t like how it was written, but I don’t know how to write like what he wants,” Harry continued. He’d gotten his first assignment back that morning, marked T, and with so much red marking that you could barely make out the original essay. Harry was not happy about it.

“I’m sorry, what do you mean, he didn’t like how it was written? Do you have it with you?”

“Um, yeah, hold on.” Harry dug into his bag. “Here you go.”

The Professor took the paper and started reading, frowning just at the look of the paper with all red ink over it. After a few moments she asked “Would you mind if I held onto this for a little while, Mr. Potter?”

“Um, okay, that’s fine. But can you tell me what I did wrong? I don’t really understand what he means when he says I write like a chimpanzee. I get that it’s wrong, but isn’t he supposed to tell me what would be right? How I can make my next one better?” Harry knew he sounded like he was whining, but he was used to getting at least passing grades (and that was when he deliberately made mistakes so he wouldn’t show up his cousin and get accused of cheating), and a fail on his first assignment for the class bothered him.

“I’ll talk to you about it when you have your next assignment, dear. Make sure to let me know and I can go over it with you before it’s due. Don’t worry about this one for now.”

“Okay. So my next question is about how I became the Boy-Who-Lived,” Harry’s tone of voice made it clear it was not a title he liked. “What exactly did I do? I know they say I got rid of Voldemort…”

“Please, don’t say his name. We don’t say his name.”

Harry paused and shrugged. It was a minor thing after all. “Okay, so they say I got rid of the Dark Lord…”

“Call him He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. His followers called him the Dark Lord.”

Harry stopped again. “Really, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, Boy-Who-Lived, what is with all these long titles for names? Anyway, I supposedly got rid of him, but what exactly was I supposed to have done?”

“No one knows. All we know is He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named went to your house, killed your parents, but when he tried to kill you he was destroyed instead. You were left with a scar on your forehead and the world was free.”

“How do you know he tried to kill me? Was anyone else there?” The goblins had told Harry what was generally known, and had let him read some old newspapers from right after his parents’ murders, but they didn’t know how Harry had survived. There wasn’t any real detail in any of the accounts, and while there were supposedly a lot of books about him, the goblins told him they were rubbish and not to bother.

“I don’t think anyone else was there, or else they probably would have died too. He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named never left witnesses. He had a signal he and his followers would display when they attacked a place so everyone knew they had been there, but they only ever left corpses behind. If you were there, than he tried to kill you. Headmaster Dumbledore didn’t say exactly how he learned what happened, but he was very clear when he let everyone know He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named was dead that you had done it.”

‘Headmaster Dumbledore? He really does get into everything.’

“I’m not sure I believe that, but okay. Um, my next question is why doesn’t magic and electricity work in the same area?”

“It doesn’t, Mr. Potter.”

“Right, I get that it doesn’t. I’m asking if anyone knows why it doesn’t.”

“…I’m not sure. I don’t know if I’ve ever heard anything about the reasons behind the problem. I can’t answer that one for you. I don’t seem to be doing very well with your questions tonight.”

Harry blushed, he hadn’t meant to make the Professor uncomfortable. He just had all these questions, and while he couldn’t ask her a lot of them until he knew if she was involved in any way with the issues that left him so ignorant about the magical world he could ask things that any muggle born would be likely to ask.

“Well, if you don’t know why it doesn’t work, I’m guessing you don’t know what experiments or tries have been made to see if something can make it work.”

“You would be correct on that. I’ve never even thought about it. It’s just always been that way.”

“Okay, well, that’s pretty much it for my questions. Did you want to go back to asking some of yours now?”

Professor Sprout gave a short little laugh. “No, Mr. Potter. I think I got to know you a little bit from the talk we just had, at least as well as I know any of your other year mates at least. I know it is Friday night, why don’t you go out and have some fun in the common room with the other students? You don’t need to worry about homework tonight and you haven’t been around the common room in the evenings much at all since the year started.”

Harry knew he was being given an order, even if it was asked as a question. “Yes, Professor. Have a good evening.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I think this is the second longest chapter of the fic so far. I want to get up to chapters between 5 and 7K words but I hit these break points where it just make sense to me to stop. Oh well. I haven't been responding to individual comments since I started writing again, but I do read them and I want to thank the person who noticed I misspelled galleon as gallon. That has been fixed. I also corrected the misspelling of Justin's last name in chapter nine. These things happen when you don't have a beta.


	11. Wills, Libraries, and the ever growing list of questions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry learns a few things, and doesn't learn about others. But he's trying.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So yeah, I was in a bad mental state for ... a while. But I have a new job and apparently that was what my muse was waiting for. So sorry about the long wait, here is the latest chapter and I am already working on the next one. 
> 
> Also, don't own.

‘So at my Aunt and Uncle’s I have to hide how smart I am and sneak around to find food, but they mostly leave me alone and don’t care what I do, as long as it’s away from them. Here I can be a bookworm and can eat all I want but I can’t seem to find time to myself and everyone wants to know what I am doing. I get that Hufflepuff is the house of loyalty and togetherness, but this is crazy,’ thought Harry a few weeks further into term.

He had continued to pass messages back and forth with the goblins as they continued to expand his education on the state of things in the wizard world. Harry’s newest concern was his parents’ wills. Or rather, the lack of his parents’ wills.

As he walked with his year mates toward the library, Harry remembered back to the conversation he had a few days ago with the portrait in his trunk.

“Sir, could you ask if the goblins managed to get ahold of a copy of my parents’ wills I could see? From what you’ve been teaching me on succession laws, even if I lived with my Aunt and Uncle as my closest relatives, there should have been someone coming by to talk to me about my holdings and whatnot,” and that explained a good chunk of Director Ragnok’s rage at their initial meeting. Harry wasn’t a pureblood, but he was going to inherit a pureblood estate complete with several vassals, a Lordship, and a seat on the Wizengamot. By long standing tradition, he should have been tutored starting when he was five on some basic topics to start preparing him to take on the Lordship formally when he hit the age of 13. Now Harry was woefully behind and trying to basically take two different full time sets of classes in an effort to catch up. His parents should have designated someone to be responsible for that, and while the goblins had told Harry his godfather was in prison for supposedly betraying his parents (supposedly, because the goblins were never given any trial transcripts or proof of guilt, and they asked for such every time the government or someone named Lucius Malfoy tried to get into the Black vaults), the goblins thought his parents would have picked someone else as this tutor. Harry didn’t quite get why the goblins didn’t think Mr. Black would have been chosen as the tutor, but that was pretty normal. Harry didn’t get why the goblins thought a lot of things. But they were bound by treaty to help him and seemed interested in helping him beyond just what they had to do, so when everything was said and done Harry was perfectly willing to go alone with the things they suggested he do and learn unless he could think of a good reason not to. And so far, the few times he had tried to object (getting up at 4:30AM every day was old after the first day, let alone going on the first month), the goblins had managed to talk him around by giving him reason after reason it was necessary. “I’d like to know who my parents asked to tutor me and maybe figure out a way to meet him or her now that I’m in the wizarding world.”

“I will ask later this morning once we are finished this morning’s session. You need to be more consistent with your swing,” replied Gerald. Gerald was a portrait of a wizard from the mid-1300s who had been a vassal to the then Slytherin Lord. The Lord had done some great favor for him, beyond the normal support of a Lord for a vassal, so Gerald had arranged to leave his portrait and extra frame to the goblins specifically for communication between the Horde and his Lord. He was just as angry as the goblins about Harry’s lack of understanding or training and was taking it as a personal mission to bring Harry up to speed as quickly as possible. And since Gerald had been a trained warrior and part of his Lord’s personal bodyguard, he felt that Harry needed protection. So while Harry couldn’t have bodyguards with him at Hogwarts, Gerald could make sure he knew how to fight with things he could find around the castle. And many of the statues in the halls had spears that could be ‘borrowed’ at need. Of course, he had Harry practicing with a wooden pole instead of an actual spear as there was less likelihood of a mistake causing serious injury.

“Yes sir.” Harry picked the staff back up and resumed practicing hitting a dummy with an overhead swing of the pole. ’30 more minutes, and then I can go shower and get breakfast.’

Xoxoxoxox

As soon as Harry had a break from class he rushed back to the dorm to check back with Gerald. The rest of the Hufflepuff first year boys were at a table in the common room, and Harry was supposed to come right back out to sit with them but he said he had to use the bathroom first. He needed to be quick about this. “Did you find out anything about the wills, Sir?”

“Hello, Harry, how was your morning? Were your classes interesting today?” came the reply in an overly polite manner. Gerald was teaching him etiquette among other things and clearly didn’t appreciate Harry’s impatience.

“Hello Gerald, my morning was fine. I hope you had a pleasant morning as well. Did you find out anything about the wills? Only I’ve got to get back out to the common room but I need to know something!”

“Yes, well, the goblins don’t have a copy.”

“We knew that before I came to Hogwarts,” Harry replied. “I wanted to know if they’ve had any luck getting a copy.”

“Remember, they need to be careful about this. It’s logical for them to be looking into you since you could reinstate the treaty, but they don’t want the rest of the wizards to think they are trying to get the treaty reinstated. They want it to look like they are looking for information without you being involved, so they can’t say they are asking on your behalf. And they can’t actually come right out and ask for it in any case because unless a will is presented to the goblins to execute a bequest, they don’t have anything to do with succession rights. The problem is that from what they have been able to find out, none of their wizard contacts in the Ministry can even find a record of the wills, let alone the actual wills themselves. It’s like your parents didn’t have wills, which is absurd. Every witch or wizard writes out a will once they have a child. It’s a basic expectation by pureblood tradition to preserve the family. Even muggles who are much less formal about things almost always have wills drawn up once there are children in the family. And in a time of war? Madness to think there wouldn’t be wills. But no wills are to be found. At all. No record of the wills being read, not even a mention of a closed reading. Nothing. It’s like they never existed, which isn’t possible,” Gerald finished up. “Now go back out there and get back with your friends.”

Xoxoxoxox

Now that Harry was spending three to four nights a week in the common room. Gerald had actually bent enough to reduce his training from 7 days a week down to 4 days a week so he didn’t have to always go to bed quite so early. Harry still normally turned in by 9 because he wanted to have some sort of consistency in his sleep patterns (Rathgrow had very firm opinions about growing boys and enough sleep). But he could vary it, and very occasionally stay up to around 10PM, and as a result was really starting to get to know his Housemates. Harry still checked his extra books when he studied in the dorm, but he found the older Hufflepuffs really did take turns working with the first years to help them get used to school. Harry was amazed that the purebloods had never been to formal school at all before, not even a day school like he used to go to. They were all without exception home schooled, and what they were taught varied widely. So while it was true most of them were bored in class because they were used to magic at home, and had maybe even tried out some spells under their parents or tutors supervision, most of them weren’t used to writing essays any more than he was. Once Harry figured that out, he felt a lot better about his struggles.

Xoxoxoxox

“Everyone keep their voices down as we go in,” Harry shook himself out of his memories and started paying attention again.

Harry didn’t know if it was because he had complained about it or not, but Professor Sprout was having all the first years take a Saturday afternoon in the library with the fifth year prefects, learning the layout of the shelves, how to use the magical card catalog, and how to request a book through the exchange program Hogwarts had with some of the other magical schools. That wasn’t the best choice in the first few years, since it took about a week and normally until students were in their Owl year they didn’t have really long term projects or assignments so the book wouldn’t arrive until too late to be used, but since they were reviewing how to use the library Porsha had explained when they set out that she thought they should know how it worked. Harry entered the library with the rest of his year and they followed Porsha to a short pedestal standing in a clear area in front of the shelves.

“Pay attention. I’m not spending my Saturday in the library to listen to myself talk. I’m doing it because this is important and you need to know it. So over here there is a catalog for the general Hogwarts library, and then over against the wall near Madam Pince’s desk there’s a different catalog magically linked to all the libraries Hogwarts has agreements with. The restricted section has its own catalog, and they all work roughly the same. Of course for right now you will be pretty much just using this one. To use any of them, take a blank request card and write out either an author, a title, or as narrow a description of the subject you want information on as possible. You need to be specific. Let’s take a look.” Porsha took two cards from the stack next to the Hogwarts catalog. “I’m requesting an author. So I write the word author, a colon, and the name, in this case one of our famous housemates Newton Scamander.” Porsha had all the first years pass the card around to see how she had written it out. Once she got the card back, she placed it face down on a little plate on the front of the stand for the catalog. The catalog glowed, and opened. Listed on the pages were listings for all the different versions of _Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them_ , as well as his children’s book _A Children’s Anthology of Monsters_ , and a few treatises he authored for various publications over the years. The list filled several pages – Porsha had all the students look as she paged back and forth.

“Now, let’s say I am writing an essay on the use of unicorn hair in wands. But I’m in a hurry, so I just write subject colon unicorn on the card.” Porsha put word to deed, filled out another card, closed the catalog on the list of books by Newton Scamander and placed the new card on the plate. “Now see, you get the same listing of all the versions of Fantastic Beasts because that book has a section on unicorns, but you also get books by Havelock Sweetling who was famous for his research and work with unicorns,  and listings of potions books that have potions that used unicorn hair or tears. There aren’t going to be any books that use unicorn blood of course. If there are books that have potions like that, Hogwarts won’t carry them even in the restricted section because it’s a horrible thing to use unicorn blood. But anyway, you see mixed in with all of this you will have books on wandlore that will talk about the use of unicorn parts in wands, which is what you wanted, but it’s all mixed in with these other books that you don’t need or want so you really have to look to find the ones you do want.” She turned page after page filled with writing. After a bit, Porsha took a third card, wrote on it, and passed it around again. When the card got to Harry he saw she had written Subject: Use of Unicorn hair in wands. The card made it back to Porsha who once again closed the catalog and placed the new card on the plate. The book glowed, and when she opened it up the listing was less than one page, as opposed to the four pages for books by Scamander or the seemingly endless pages on all things unicorn related. This time, only three entries were listed. “Now wand making is way beyond anything anyone studying at Hogwarts is ready for. Wand making is one of those fields that is still taught traditionally with a master and an apprentice and doesn’t start until the apprentice has finished basic magic schooling. So there isn’t any really good information in the library about this topic. The key thing is that the catalog shows the author, title, and shelving position of any items that do mention using unicorn hair in wands, even just in passing. Know that if I had just written unicorn hair wands, the listing would have included any book that talks about a witch or wizard using a wand with a core of unicorn hair. But by writing my subject like I did, I get a much shorter list. Take a look.” All the first years took turns looking at the page.

 _What Wand_ – Magazine, various authors, Midnight section, 3 rd bookcase, 2nd shelf

 _Code of Wand Use_ – Ministry Decree, 1631 Wizards’ Council, Gold section, 1st bookcase, 3rd shelf

 _Overview of Wand History_ – Gerbold Ollivander, Amber section, 4th bookcase, 3rd shelf

‘Okay, so the library has three items that talk about using unicorn hair in wands. I guess that’s interesting.’

“So as you can see, the library is divided into sections marked by the trim color of the shelving units. Find the proper section, count down the row to the correct bookcase, and look for the shelf, counting down from the top. Simple, really,” finished Porsha.

“Miss Corner?”

“Yes, Bones isn’t it? You have a question?”

“How do we tell the different colors? I only mean, gold and amber look awfully alike.”

Porsha Corner looked at the group of first years, who all turned when Susan Bones spoke up, and who were all nodding their heads in agreement.

“And what color is midnight?” added Zach Smith. “Midnight is a time, not a color.”

“Midnight is so a color, you boy, it’s a very dark blue,” shot back Hannah Abbott immediately.

“Well I didn’t know that, either…”Ernie McMillian said.

“Silence! This is a library, not your common room. If you are going to argue, you can all leave.” Madam Pince stalked over to the group.

“Sorry, Madam Pince, the first years were just confused on how to identify the colors properly and it turned into a discussion on what is and is not a name for a color.”

“Hm, did you show them how to use their query card to locate the item they want?”

“…Um, I don’t know what you mean. I showed them how to be specific when they write their card to get a manageable list…”

“Where’s the card?”

“Here it is, Madam Pince,” said Justin, handing over the card from the pedestal.

“All right, pay attention. You tap the entry you want to find with your wand. … Well, someone come tap one of the entries, I don’t have all day here.”

Harry looked around and saw that most of his class were hanging back, and the prefect was looking like she was sucking on a lemon. He stepped forward and tapped his wand on the middle entry, as that looked like something useful to read through. He was sure it would have information on the underage restrictions, and that was something he wanted to know more about but wasn’t willing to ask any adult.

“Now tap your wand on your query card. Quickly, so the tracker doesn’t have time to fade.”

Harry tapped his wand on the card Madam Pince was holding out. One of the sides of the card began to glow faintly.

“Now, you walk in the direction of the glow.” Putting action to words, Madam Pince turned to her right, causing the glow to move to the leading edge of the card, and started walking. After a short stroll down the shelves, she stopped at the end of a row of shelves. “Now you can see the glow has moved back to the side of the card. This is the gold section.” She pointed to the end of the bookcase, which had gold trim on one side, and a purple trim on the other. “We don’t put similar colors on shelves with two sides to avoid confusion.” She stepped into the row, and ran her finger along the proper shelf. “And here we are. _Code of Wand Use_. This works for any book in the Hogwarts library. The restricted section has a separate catalog, of course, and if you need something from another library, you would copy the entry which will give the library that has the book instead of a section, bookcase, and shelf designation. Those cards you bring to the desk for processing. I need to get back to the desk. If you have further questions, find me there.” With that, Madam Pince put the volume back on the shelf and walked away.

“Well, I learned something new as well today,” said Porsha. “Why don’t we head back and you can all try it for yourselves.”

The students turned back around and started walking back toward the front of the library. Harry looked around, then pulled _Code of Wand Use_ back down. He pulled one of his normal text books out of his bag and put it on top of the Code book, and started walking back to the front, already thinking of how to turn some of the questions from his notebook into subject searches for the catalog. This could be very useful.

Xoxoxoxox

“Hey Justin, can I ask what grade Professor Snape gave you on your homework?”

“Sure, Harry, I got an A. I thought for sure I’d finally get an EE on a Potions assignment, but no such luck.”

“This is nuts. How did I get a T, when you got an A? We used the same references, answered the same questions, and included the same information. This makes no sense.” Having gotten back yet another failing grade on his Potions work, Harry was beyond frustrated. “Professor Spout even looked it over and said it should be fine. How can he take points off for my ink being too thick? How can ink be too thick?” Harry’s rant was starting to draw attention from other students in the common room.

“Can I see that, Harry?” asked Porsha. The fifth year prefects were the ones who helped the most with the first years, and Porsha was the one overseeing the study session in the common room that night. “Professor Sprout said you were having some issues with your potions assignments, but she seemed to think it had been fixed after she looked at the one you turned in last week.”

“That’s this one. I took it to her like she asked me to, and she explained how to better organize my information when I am writing an essay. She wouldn’t really talk about the actual information since that is what I was supposed to be showing I learned and she said she didn’t want to give me an unfair advantage, but she didn’t say it was horrible, and she did give me lots of feedback on what order I should talk about things and explained transition statements to connect the paragraphs better and stuff. I thought I’d be fine. But this…This is not fine.” Harry knew he sounded like he was whining again, the same as he did the first time he got an essay back from Professor Snape, but darn it all, this was NOT fair. Teachers were supposed to be fair – if the information was right it should pass and if it was wrong it shouldn’t. The same information shouldn't get a pass for one student and a fail for another.

“I think we’d better take this to Professor Sprout,” said Porsha. “If she looked it over, and you failed, there is something wrong. She might not have told you anything specific about the information, but first year potions is pretty basic and I’m sure she knows if you were right or wrong, and I can’t see her not telling you to do more research, or to go back to the assignment and take a second look if you were way off.”

“And I passed, and the information we included was the same because we did the research together. We did write our essays on our own, but the stuff we wrote about was pretty much identical,” piped up Justin.

“I’m sorry, what?” asked Porsha.

“Here, look. You can compare the two parchments. We included the same ingredients,” Justin pointed to each parchment in turn, “we had the same preparation method, and had the same note about not using any silver preparation tools because it would affect the final outcome. We wrote it up a little different, but all the facts are the same. And I got an acceptable, and Harry got a troll. That can’t be right.”

“Okay, now we definitely have to go to Professor Sprout. Because that is nuts.”

 

Xoxoxoxoxox

Harry knocked quietly on the door to the study room Professor Sprout had identified when she let him know she needed to meet with him privately again. He wasn’t sure what had happened after Porsha took him and Justin to meet with the professor and she had seen their essays, but it seemed like Snape had spent the entire time during dinner tonight trying to kill him by looks alone. Harry had taken to trying to block line of sight with another student because it was making him too uncomfortable to eat.

“Come in,” he heard.

“Professor Sprout, you wanted to see me?”

“Yes Mr. Potter, please come in. I spoke to Professor Snape about the two essays. He didn’t realize that you and Justin had done your research together, and he failed you because he thought you had cheated on the assignment. I explained the confusion, and he has adjusted your grade to also be Acceptable.”

Harry personally thought Professor Snape failed him because Snape clearly hated his guts and probably wished he’d be expelled, but he wasn’t about to say that out loud, even if so far Professor Sprout had been more helpful than anyone else (not a goblin) than Harry had ever met.

“Thanks, Professor. I really appreciate it. I wouldn’t cheat. I just wouldn’t.”

“And I made that clear to Professor Snape,” came the reply. ‘Oh boy, I bet that whole conversation went so well. That sounds like Professor Sprout kinda yelled at Professor Snape. No wonder Snape looked like he wanted to strangle me during dinner if Professor Sprout yelled at him, told him he was wrong, and made him change the grade. That’s going to make class on Friday worse than ever I bet. Oh well. That’s still a few days away. Let me get through the rest of the week first.’


	12. A New Friend, and a New Ally too?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry continues asking questions, and finds a new friend who asks them too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well I am continuing to find inspiration to write. And finding that sometimes characters decide they don't want to go in the direction you thought they would. If you are surprised by the end of the chapter, trust me, I doubt you are more surprised than I was. It was NOT in my original plan at all. Now I am redoing half my story. But I do have a good chunk written on the next chapter - so much so that I may end up chopping into two pieces in which case the next chapter will come that much sooner. I'll see. Still no beta, still not mine.

“What are you doing?”

Harry looked up to see a rather bushy haired girl looking at him with an annoyed expression on her face. “Excuse me, what do you mean? I’m using the catalog” he replied.

“Catalog? That’s a catalog? There is a catalog? I’ve been looking for a card catalog since I first found the library. It doesn’t look like any card catalog I’ve ever seen. How do you use it?”

Harry stood blinking. The girl had spoken so fast it took him a minute to realize she had actually asked a question needing a response. “Um, what’s something you want to find?”

“You can just show me with what you are looking up, I don’t mind and I can look up what I want once I understand how it works,” came back the response.

Harry didn’t want to do that, as he was currently trying to find information on the Potter and Black families to try to learn more about his history and his godfather and didn’t really want anyone to realize he was researching the information. Which was making it hard as he didn’t know a lot of names he was trying to get information on, so he didn’t know who to look up. “No, I think it would be better if you looked up something for yourself. That way I can walk you through it but you can be doing it. Here’s a card, and a quill. What is something you want to know about? You can search by author, or the book title, or a subject. But if you are looking for subject, you need to be really specific or you get back tons of results.” Harry proceeded to explain how the catalog worked, using the example search that Porsha had used when she explained it to the Hufflepuff first years but not actually doing the searches.

“Wow. That sounds a lot faster than looking up references card by card or using the microfiche system like in my neighborhood library.”

Harry didn’t think that needed a comment. He stood waiting for the girl to do whatever search she needed so he could get back to trying to look up information on his family. After a minute he realized the girl was also just standing there.

“Did you want to do a search?”

“I was waiting for you to finish since I interrupted you. Sorry about that, by the way, I was just so confused as to why you kept going back and forth to this podium and the shelves, and why you would hold a card out in front of you every time you were going to the shelves, but not when you came back.”

“No, it’s fine. And I was always taught to let ladies go first. So go ahead and do your search.” Harry did NOT want anyone seeing that he was reduced to looking for information on his family in a library. It just didn’t seem right.

“Um, since I didn’t know what you were doing, I don’t actually have a search in mind. You can go ahead while I think about what would help most in my Transfiguration homework this week” came the reply.

Well this was no fun. Harry didn’t want to run his search with her standing there, but she didn’t seem likely to move until he had. Time to change the subject. “By the way, I don’t think we’ve actually met. I’m Harry Potter” and he shifted to hold his things just with his left arm and held out his hand to shake.

“Oh, I know who you are. I read all about you in _Modern Magical History_ and _Great Wizarding Events of the Twentieth Century_. And I remember what you looked like from the Sorting since I was sorted before you. I was so disappointed you didn’t sort to Gryffindor. I was hoping to be in the same house with you. But you sorted to Hufflepuff, so that didn’t happen” again the information came out fast and furious, like she had to get it out as fast as she possibly could.

“Um, okay, I haven’t seen those books, but I’m pretty sure whatever they wrote probably isn’t that complete or accurate because until I got my letter I hadn’t spoken to anyone from the Wizarding world that I can remember, so I don’t know how they could have gotten information for you to know all about me. And you know who I am, but I don’t know your name, and it’s still polite to formally introduce myself since this is the first time we are talking,” Harry replied, still holding his hand out.

“Oh! I didn’t think about that but you are so right. I’m sorry, I’m Hermione Granger,” and she reached out to shake his hand.

“Lovely” came a sarcastic drawl. “Now that you’ve managed to get each other’s names, could you either run a search or clear the way? Because some people are actually trying to get homework done instead of participating in social hour.”

With a start both Harry and Hermione turned slightly to see an older student in Ravenclaw robes staring at them (and the catalog pedestal behind them) with a raised eyebrow. They turned back to look at each other and wordlessly agreed to get out of the way.

“Come this way,” Hermione said as she started to walk away. “If you want to, that is” she continued in a softer voice with an uncertain tone. “I mean, you don’t have to.”

“It’s fine. Where are we going?”

“I’m set up at a table along the outer wall, near a window. It’s down this way. So I could see you going back and forth down the aisle with a card out in front of you, and when I got up to grab a book I would sometimes see you at the catalog – not that I knew it was a catalog then – and I had no idea what you were doing. It made no sense to me,” came out in a rush, in a rather embarrassed tone.

“Really, it’s fine. You like things to make sense, right? And you ask questions when it doesn’t make sense. So that seems perfectly sensible to me. I’ve done that myself,” offered Harry. ‘Not that I’ve been having much luck when I’ve asked many of my questions, but I have tried to get answers so things make sense.’

“Okay. Some people get upset when I ask questions. But things should make sense, and the rules seem to be different for so much stuff in the magical world, and how am I supposed to understand the rules I can’t find in books if no one will explain them to me. Or even know what the rules are at all?” With a huff Hermione put her things down at a table already stacked with various piles of books, many looking much too advanced to be part of the normal first year studies. “And why aren’t the rules in books? There should be something more than the ‘Introduction to Magic’ pamphlet Professor McGonagall left with us when she brought my letter. I mean, it was nice to have an overview, but 16 pages is nowhere near enough to explain a whole different land with a different culture and customs. Which is what the magical world is, even if it’s geographically in the same area as Britain.”

Harry just sat down and made a little space to rest his arms. He placed the couple of items he had found so far that mentioned his parents – a copy of a Witch Weekly magazine that had an article about his parent’s wedding, and an older copy of Magical Who’s Who that had listings for his father and grandfather – in his school bag, since he just knew if Hermione saw them she would ask questions he didn’t want to answer right now.

“So what are you working on? This seems a bit much for a 1 foot essay on the similarities and differences between matchsticks and needles,” said Harry.

“Oh I actually completed that essay the day Professor McGonagall assigned it. It took me 3 ft, but I think I covered everything I needed to,” came the reply.

“So you don’t need to research anything for the Transfiguration homework.”

“Um…”

“What are you looking for?”

“Um…”

Hermione’s face was slowly turning red, she was biting her lower lip, and her eyes were firmly aimed at the table top and not looking at Harry. Whatever she wanted to know about was clearly something she didn’t want to say.

“You know, it’s fine. You don’t have to tell me. I can just…” as he spoke, Harry started to get back up from the table.

“NO!” came an immediate cry. “Please don’t go,” Hermione continued in a calmer, lower tone. “Only, you are the only one to actually seem to be willing to talk to me. I thought it would be different here, finding out I had magic; I thought that explained why no one at school liked me. They could feel I was different and didn’t want to get to know me. I thought I’d find people like me, who would like me,” and in such a quiet tone that Harry had to strain to hear, “I thought I’d find friends.”

Harry sat back down. “I think I’d like to be friends. I didn’t have friends before coming here either. I think having friends is brilliant.”

Hermione looked up with a hopeful expression. “Really, you want to be friends with me? None of my housemates want to be friends. They all think I should have been in Ravenclaw, but the hat said…” her voice trailed off and her face stiffened.

“That’s okay, you don’t need to share what the hat said. It talked to me a bit before sorting me too. I get it.” Harry quickly said. “Hey, not to deliberately change the subject or anything, but you said something about a pamphlet, Introduction to Magic? Do you have it here at school? And if so, could I take a look at it?”

“I left it with my parents. It doesn’t have a lot of information but it had some references and contacts for muggle parents. Why would you need to look at a silly little thing like that? Your parents were magical, and you’ve been raised-“

“Please stop. Whatever you think about how I was raised I guarantee it was wrong. I was raised by non-magical relatives on my mother’s side and had no idea I was a wizard until I finally got to read one of the letters they kept sending and my uncle kept destroying. I don’t know what you’ve read, but no one from the magical world ever spoke to me until my eleventh birthday. I have not ridden a dragon or tamed a Nundu, and I do not have a unicorn friend. I was asking about the pamphlet because I was curious to see if it mentioned anything that I don’t know because everyone I talk to from the teachers to the students automatically thinks of me as being a part of the magical world all my life, and that’s simply not true.” Harry was getting a little tired of the assumptions everyone seemed to make about his life. He finally got it through to the other Hufflepuffs that they should treat him like a muggleborn in terms of what information he was expected to know (i.e. nothing). Now it seemed he was going to have to go through it again anytime he got to know someone from one of the other houses as well.

“Of course you haven’t ridden a dragon. And Nundus are the most dangerous magical beast there is – it takes dozens of wizards working together to defeat one and they are considered to be untamable. Why would you think I thought those things? That’s ridiculous.”

“Okay, so that was some of the things that a lot of my magical raised housemates thought – something about a line of children’s books they remembered reading when they were younger. I had really had to repeat myself a ton of times that none of it was true before they’d believe me. What were you going to say about how I was raised? Was this from _Great Wizarding Events of the Twentieth Century_?”

“No, that one focused mostly on the defeat of You-Know-Who and the effect on the Wizarding world. It was actually from _Modern Magical History_. The History said that after your parents died, Headmaster Dumbledore was appointed your guardian and you’d been raised and trained in a safe place all your life. It seemed to say that the Headmaster had been overseeing your upbringing.”

Harry’s eyebrows rose at this new information. The goblins hadn’t really said much about his living situation prior to coming to the bank after they had convinced his aunt to give up his things other than he was never to go back to them. Considering how much they didn’t like the Headmaster, he wondered why they hadn’t warned him that the man had been appointed his guardian. “Um, okay, that’s the first I’ve heard of that. I’ve never met or spoken to the headmaster that I can recall and I promise you I was raised without any interaction or knowledge of the magical world.”

“But, this was a reference. It had citations, and dates, and excerpts from transcripts, and-“

“Miss Granger. I get that this wasn’t one of the children’s books, but it was still wrong, or at least misleading. I think I should know how I was raised, and while Surrey might be considered a safe place, it is also a very… Let me just say that I don’t ever remember seeing the headmaster, and considering the normal person in my old neighborhood, I’m pretty sure I would have remembered seeing him or remembered hearing about someone else seeing him, if he had ever actually come around. And I don’t know what it meant by trained, but I attended a standard primary school until I came here.”

Hermione looked like someone had kicked her puppy, if she had a puppy. Harry felt bad about making her upset, but he was really tired of everyone making assumptions about him and his life. Harry was finding out that everything everyone one believed was wrong, but everyone still seemed to believe it. It was crazy. And it seemed like it was taking forever to change their minds.

“I’m sorry, Harry. I won’t bring up anything else from those books. Or wait, should it be I’m sorry Mr. Potter? I thought we were going to be friends, but you used my last name, and do friends still use last names? The group that picked… The group that I tended to interact with the most with at primary all called each other by given names.”

“Yes we’ve been talking about being friends, and for the record unless we have a falling out I would say that now we are friends, but I used your last name because you haven’t given me permission to use your first name yet. It’s something I learned recently; the wizarding world still has all these etiquette rules that have fallen out of fashion in the non-magical world, and one of the most important basic rules is that you aren’t supposed to use a person’s given name unless they give the okay. Particularly when a male addresses a female. It’s considered really rude apparently.”

“Oh, wow. Really? How very Jane Austen. I’ve probably been insulting people left and right. No wonder no one wants to talk to me. Well please call me Hermione in the future, if we are friends. I don’t think friends should have to use my last name.”

Personally Harry thought it could be that no one wanted to talk to Hermione because she tended to talk so fast it made understanding her a little difficult, but since it was the first time they had really ever spoken he wasn’t going to say anything yet. She might just be a little nervous. But if she didn’t slow down her rate of speech the next time they spoke, he was going to have to say something about it.

“And you of course can call me Harry.”

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxox

“Good evening, Gerald. How are you this evening?” Harry said in greeting as he stepped into his training room.

“I am well this evening young Lord. And how are you?” came the reply.

“I am also well, thank you for asking. I heard something interesting today. I heard that Headmaster Dumbledore was appointed my guardian. Could you see if there is any truth to that statement? I didn’t see the book the information came from directly, but I was told that it was supposed to be a reference book about recent events in the magical world, and my supposed defeat of Voldemort and the aftermath was covered.”

Gerald chuckled. “Now that had to be hard, to remember to open with a polite greeting and response when I am sure you have been dying to ask that question since you were told the information. Very well done.”

“Thank you. I am trying. There is just so much.”

“And to answer your question, Dumbledore was appointed by the Wizengamot as your guardian, but the goblins don’t formally recognize it for financial matters because the appointment was in conflict with the fiduciary custodian arrangements your parents made when they went into hiding. So he while he does have legal control of your person – where you live and so forth – until your majority, and that technically should also include control over your finances, he has been denied access to your vaults on the basis that the existing custodial arrangements take precedence.”

“What? I don’t understand. The goblins keep saying they don’t have copies of my parents’ wills. So…”

“This arrangement is separate from the wills. Your parents named your godfather as their fiduciary alternate for your trust vault-“

“Wait. What does fiduciary mean?” Harry was now completely lost.

“Fiduciary refers to responsibility one person takes on behalf of another to manage finances in the best interest of the owner of the funds. In this case, you own the funds, but your parents named your godfather as the person who could access the funds on your behalf if they were unable to. Therefore he is your fiduciary custodian and-”

“Wait, Godfather. You said my Godfather was named. This is the same Godfather I've been researching, right? I don't have another one? This is the Godfather who is in prison the goblins told me about a while back, the wizard who should have been my guardian, right? How can he still be responsible if he’s a criminal? If he’s not my guardian because he’s in prison, how is he still my whatdidyoucallit, fiduciary custodian? THIS MAKES NO SENSE!”

“Shut it young man. It is not polite to shout in these circumstances. In any circumstances, really. It is uncouth,” said Gerald in a very disapproving tone. “And as I understand it, while he is currently in prison, and has been there since shortly after your parents’ deaths, there were irregularities in his case and the goblins are not willing to remove his responsibility from the vault and replace him with someone else – certainly not the headmaster – until the records are clarified.”

“Wait, that’s right, I remember something about that now. The Ministry and some guy try to access the Black vaults every so often, but the goblins always say they need the formal trial transcripts to grant access without the vault owner being present.”

Harry blinked at bit as he thought about it, and then reached into his bag and pulled out the notebook he was tracking non-school related questions. He was definitely going to have to find a way to buy another notebook before the year was out at this rate, and the calendar year not school year at that; the current book was now over a half full and September still had several days to go. He was never going to make it. This alone was going to take up another few pages since he started listing only one question per page to leave room for notes and related follow up questions, and he figured he actually better leave several pages for these new questions on his Godfather since there were so many other related questions, and then at least another two pages for questions on Dumbledore’s control and what it did and did not cover. Maybe Hermione was going home for the holidays and could pick him up another notebook or two…

Xoxoxoxoxoxo

Potions class. His first potions class since Professor Sprout had gotten his grade on that homework assignment adjusted. Harry walked in with his head down and shuffled onto the bench next to Justin. He had tried to get Justin to agree to change seats to further back, but Justin didn’t think it was worth the hassle of asking someone else to move further up. None of the Hufflepuffs wanted Professor Snape to pay more attention to them than necessary, and Justin was right when he said if the Professor wanted to single Harry out because of the whole homework thing, moving what seat he was using wasn’t going to make that big of a difference.

“The potion is on the board. No talking,” came Professor Snape’s normal instructions. The students collected their ingredients from the cabinet and started brewing. Unlike most classes, where Snape stalked around the room making sarcastic comments and point out every little thing anyone did wrong, this class he was staying seated at his desk, seemingly content with just glaring out at the students and not talking at all.

‘This is really weird. I thought Professor Snape would be all over me after Professor Sprout’s talk with him, but he hasn’t said word one.’

As the class was coming to a close and he and Justin ladled out vials of their potion to turn in, Harry marked his vial with his name and turned to Justin with his best impression of what he had heard referred to as puppy eyes when a fellow 1st year Hufflepuff was trying to get a 4th year to help her with her assignment earlier in the week.

“Not on a bet. You know Snape expects everyone to turn in their own work. And considering the hassle with our last written assignment, I would think you don’t want to push the rules.”

‘I don’t want to push Snape is more like it.’

With a sigh, Harry gathered up his things, packed up his bag, and picked up his potion vial to turn in. He got in the line of students walking up to the desk to drop off their potions from the day, keeping his head down and walking by looking at the heels of the person he was following.

He placed his vial down on the desk when he got to the head of the line and started to turn away when he was stopped by Professor Snape. “Mr. Potter. We need to discuss your last assignment. Stay behind.” Harry heard in a low, measured tone.

‘I wonder if Professor Snape had lessons on voice control similar to what Sharptooth was trying to get me to understand. He certainly manages to add meaning without adding words.’

Harry stepped to the side, and waited while the rest of the class finished turning in their assignments and filed out of the room. Justin gave him a commiserating look after dropping of his vial, and the other Hufflepuffs shot him encouraging smiles as well. Harry liked his year mates in general, and was slowly starting to get to know them through the evenings in the common room, but it was hard for him to open up and no one really knew him well yet. It was nice to see they were wishing him luck though.

After the last student filed out, Snape rose from his desk, swept the collection of vials into a satchel and started off toward the side of the classroom. “Don’t just stand there like a ninny Potter, come along” he snapped as he walked away. Harry quickly started after him. When Professor Snape reached the wall he pulled out his wand and waved it in a short pattern, speaking a few words too softly for Harry to make out. An archway formed out of the stones, similar to how Diagon Alley was accessed from the Leaky Cauldron. ‘Wow’.

Harry followed the Professor through the archway and it reformed to a solid wall as they passed. They were now in a room somewhat smaller than the classroom, with shelves lining the walls and a desk off to one side. There was a chair in front of the desk that Professor Snape wordlessly indicated Harry should take as he sat himself down at the chair behind the desk. Harry took the seat a little nervously, and sat his bag down at his feet. He folded his hands in his lap, and stared down at them without saying a word.

“Mr. Potter.”

Harry waited a moment to see if there was anything else before replying, “Yes Sir?”

“Look at me when I speak to you, Potter” snapped the Professor.

Harry raised his head a bit. He was trying hard to stay calm, but this was bringing up painful memories of false accusations from primary, times when Dudley had done something and blamed Harry, or times when Harry didn’t have his homework because Dudley and his gang had destroyed it, or he hadn’t had time to finish it because of chores, and the teachers would accuse him of being a slacker, or a liar. Harry had never had a one on one interaction with a teacher go well, and from his previous interactions with Snape, he wasn’t expecting any different from this one.

“Professor Sprout” growled out Professor Snape “has assured me that you did not in fact cheat on your last homework assignment. She was adamant that you completed it on your own, and the fact that all the information in the essay matched point for point with another student was because the two of you collaborated on your research and not because you read his essay and copied it into your own words.” Professor Snape fell silent, as if he was waiting to see if Harry had would speak.

Harry didn’t say anything; he figured Professor Sprout would have said anything that needed to be said about the whole thing, and Professor Snape hadn’t asked a question. After a moment Professor Snape started speaking again.

“In light of her assurances, I revised your grade to an Acceptable, the same as I gave your year mate Mr. Finch-Finchley,” and again he paused his speaking for a moment. “Mr. Potter, you **will** look at me when I am speaking to you.”

Harry raised his eyes a little further, up from the mid chest area he had been focusing on, until his eyes met Professor Snape’s. All of a sudden, those memories of prior teacher interactions started playing in his head again, more vivid than before. Then he started flashing on other memories from his time at the Dursleys. In rapid order he remembered waking up in his cupboard bedroom, being chased by Dudley and his gang around the neighborhood, and being attacked by Ripper as Aunt Marge and Uncle Vernon laughed in the background. He then saw Ragnok, the altar he was scanned on while at the bank, and a training session with Sharptooth. His head flared in pain, and Harry jerked so hard he caused the chair to tip over, spilling him onto the floor. Harry scrambled to his feet, grabbing his bag, and backed up rapidly. He once again was staring more at the floor than the Professor because while Harry didn’t know what had happened, he was sure Professor Snape was behind it. And it seemed to be linked to looking directly in his eyes. Harry’s automatic scan of the room when he had first entered hadn’t shown any visible doors and once the archway they had come through had closed there was no way he could see that he could leave. But there was a clear area in the center that Harry thought gave him a better chance to dodge if Professor Snape was going to try anything. Or anything else, rather, since he’d already tried whatever that memory thing was.

“Mr. Potter.”

Harry didn’t move, and didn’t look up.

“Mr. Potter! Sit back down.”

Harry’s reaction was to hunch in his shoulders a bit more and to slide a little toward where the archway had been. Maybe could figure out how to get it to open again?

“Mr. Potter, we need to talk so you will come back here and sit down like a civilized child and stop acting like a wounded animal. I won’t ask again.” The professor’s voice was getting both soft and hard at the same time – soft in volume and hard in tone. Harry was actually surprised he wasn’t yelling his head off. If Harry had made Uncle Vernon repeat himself over and over his Uncle would have been shouting so loud half the street would have heard. Of course, if he’d been with his Uncle he wouldn’t be in a room with no exits so he’d probably already been able to escape.

“Are you going to do whatever it was that you just did again?” Even to Harry that sentence didn’t make much sense, and he came out with it. But he needed to know. Not that the Professor couldn’t say he would and then do it anyway, but at least then Harry would know for sure that he couldn’t trust Professor Snape. Not that he trusted him now, but that was a generic sort of ‘I don’t trust anyone I don’t know’ thing. It’s not like being hated and picked on by teachers was new after all. And he had changed the grade after Professor Sprout talked to him about it which put him ahead of any other teacher Harry had had grade issues with in the past. So Harry figured he didn’t have a specific reason not to trust Snape just yet, but he was ready to start if that mind thing happened again.

“No Mr. Potter. I will not be doing that thing again as you term it. I realize it was unpleasant for you, but I needed to confirm the information I had been given was accurate before having this conversation with you. Now come back and sit down.” Harry didn’t understand what the images from his head had to do with his potions assignment and grade, but he walked back over to the desk and sat down.

“Mr. Potter, it has become clear to me that the Headmaster has not been in the past, and is not now in the present, acting in anything resembling your best interests. In actuality there seems to be a strong possibility leaning toward probability that he is working to facilitate your demise. As I am sworn to protect you to the best of my abilities, I find this somewhat concerning.”

Harry fell off his chair again.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, so that last scene just kind of wrote itself in a 20 min span when I was utterly inspired and had no idea from where. Also, on a different note from earlier in the chapter, before you complain that Hermione would have used a computer at her local library, please remember that comparing Hogwarts search function/catalog to card catalogs and microfiche systems is valid as those systems are time period appropriate for when the original books were supposed to take place - the web had literal JUST gone live the month before Harry started at Hogwarts and there was no such thing as google. While libraries were early adopters of electronic catalogs as it made updating easier, they were still not widespread yet at all. Most small local libraries would have the card catalog and/or micro fiche system in place.


	13. Portraits hear the darndest things

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry has meetings. Some planned, some not so planned.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Still not mine. Still no beta.
> 
> Reminder how the last chapter ended:
> 
> “Mr. Potter, it has become clear to me that the Headmaster has not been in the past, and is not now in the present, acting in anything resembling your best interests. In actuality there seems to be a strong possibility leaning toward probability that he is working to facilitate your demise. As I am sworn to protect you to the best of my abilities, I find this somewhat concerning.”
> 
> Harry fell off his chair again.

“Mr. Potter. Do try to act like a civilized human being and not as the chimpanzee your scribbling invokes. We do not have much time to speak before suspicions will be raised and I was informed you are brighter than your performance in my classroom so far has suggested,” Professor Snape said in a severe tone. 

‘He was informed? By who? And what the heck is demise?’

“Uh, sorry Professor,” Harry said as he picked himself back up and got back onto the chair. “But I’m really confused. You don’t like me” ‘Understatement of the year’ “and now you tell me you are supposed to protect me? How does making me not like you help protect me? Unless that was just for your jollies and the protecting bit is separate.” ‘I probably shouldn’t have said that last bit out loud, but there is no way he could have thought I’d think he hung the moon with everything he did.’

“At last a semi-intelligent question, if asked somewhat rudely. The headmaster knows of my vow to protect you as he was the one that served as witness. But he is also aware that your father and I had shall I say a less than salubrious relationship while students so my not favoring you in any way, and in fact singling you out for negative attention, considering your astonishing physical resemblance to my past tormentor, would not be taken as anything amiss. My reasoning was that if the headmaster assumes I do not like you and will protect you only due to the vow he might think that I may observe only the letter of the vow and protect you when you are in imminent threat in my immediate presence, and not the spirit of the vow, to protect you from all true threats at all times to the best of my ability. If the headmaster made such an assumption from my treatment of you, then he might be less cautious, or more honest, in his interactions with me, as has proven to be the case.  Not that he was anything resembling direct, but his true intents were discernible if one was looking for them. Now, as a discussion of your last assignment would not take long, we cannot draw this out very much more so I will continue. Pay attention, this is vital to your continued well-being.  

This morning I noticed you exchange glances with Hagrid after receiving a note via your owl. From comments he made afterward I ascertained that you will be visiting him at some point in the near future, likely this afternoon once classes are done for the day. That interaction is what forced this meeting; much as I would have preferred to put it off as long as possible, the normal communication method developed for me to pass on information would be too slow to deliver this warning. The headmaster is hoping to encourage you to emulate your father’s recklessness and certainly hopes that in doing so you will meet an untimely end. With that in mind, be cautious of any information you are provided about your father’s exploits at school from any source, but particularly Hagrid as he has a somewhat different interpretation of dangerous than an eleven year old should. Or a normal adult wizard should for that matter. While the events I imagine he will convey are undoubtedly true, it is likely he will share stories from when your father was older and better trained. Your father also was never alone on his wildest adventures and had other protections you currently lack, so while it is fine to listen to stories, DO NOT under any circumstances attempt to emulate the activities you will hear about regardless of any temptation to try to feel closer to your paternal parent. I will be exceedingly displeased if you do, and you will not like my resulting actions, should you manage to survive your foolishness.

In the meantime I will continue to work to uncover the headmaster’s longer term goals where you are concerned, and will pass any information I uncover through the goblins. You may ask questions in return through your goblin contact, though I may choose not to answer them. Such a method however is not particularly fast however as I mentioned earlier, and I felt that you needed to know quickly of the danger you may face, and that all is not as it appears in this castle.

Before we part there is one more thing that must be addressed. As you just experienced, it is possible for a wizard who has the proper skill and training to access memories from another wizard’s mind. I possess this skill and training, obviously, but more to the point where you are concerned, so does the headmaster. He has not attempted to meet with you in private as of yet, and you do not tend to spend much time observing the head table during meals so there has been little opportunity for him to seek access to your thoughts, but with my own involvement now obvious and increasing you may be tempted to turn your gaze that way more frequently. Do NOT do so. Even a passing glance could compromise your current thoughts if he is so inclined, and if you are looking toward me this interaction will undoubtedly be the easiest thing to grab if he decides to take a look which would put both of us at greatly increased risk. There is a defense to such mental invasions; I have already sent notice to the goblins that they will need to provide you with basic meditation instruction which is the starting point to develop proper Occulmency shields. Once their trainer feels you have developed enough through self-study I will find a way to meet with you in private again to test your defenses and give you feedback on your progress.

And now that I have given you the necessary warnings, you will leave and continue upon your day. Remember if anyone asks I admonished you to ensure at least some of your research for essays is done independently to avoid any impression of cheating in the future. You may exit to the corridor through the door behind you.” With that the Professor stood up and swept back to the wall they had entered through. The arch reformed as he approached, and closed immediately behind him once he had passed.

Harry sat in stunned silence for a moment. The sheer amount of information and warnings, not to mention the shock of having the supposed dungeon bat of a potions professor actively helping him was overwhelming. After a bit he shook himself and decided that he needed to get moving (and talk to Gerald). Harry stood up, grabbing his bag as he did so, and turned to the wall behind him. That now held a door. That hadn’t been there when he walked in the room. Magic was amazing, but also sucked sometimes. He would have felt a lot better about meeting with Snape if he knew he had an exit. Of course after that thing with his thoughts that Snape did he might have been through the exit before hearing what Snape had to say so he could kinda see Snape’s point in hiding the door. Harry stopped just at the exit and listened to see if he could hear any sound from the hallway. Hearing nothing, not that that was a guarantee or anything, he slowly opened the door and peeked through. Not seeing anyone either, he stepped through and pulled the door shut behind him, where it promptly managed to disappear again. Harry took off running. He had to get back to the dorm and ask Gerald about what the Professor had said!

Xoxoxoxoxoxox

“Gerald, GERALD!”

“We’ve talked about proper decorum more than once young man. There is-“

“GERALD! This is important, and he said it couldn’t wait for it to be passed through the goblins as that’s too slow. Professor Snape says the headmaster is … is … I got it! He says the headmaster is trying to facilitate my demise. He made it sound like something awful, and he says he’s supposed to protect me ‘cause of some vow and-“

“MR. POTTER!”

Harry stopped his rush of words to stare at the portrait. He had never heard Gerald yell before, not even that time early this week when he did something really stupid while training and tried to copy a move he’d seen in a kung fu movie Dudley had been watching while Harry was cleaning one day, and he had managed to break the practice stave he was using nearly impaling himself on the broken end in the process. Thankfully he hadn’t actually been really hurt, just a little bruised, and Sharptooth had provided several copies of each practice weapon so he didn’t have to stop training, but still.

“Thank you. Now, the Professor confirmed that the headmaster is trying to kill you?”

“Kill me!?! What!?! Whatdoyoumeantryingtokillme?!?”

“That is what ‘facilitate your demise’ means, Mr. Potter. The most direct interpretation means the professor thinks the headmaster is trying to help your death, but I would think my interpretation of what he actually meant is correct.”

“Woah. I knew the goblins don’t like the headmaster and think he’s hinky, but he’s trying to get me killed? I need to sit down.” Harry put actions to words and sat down directly on the floor.

“Mr. Potter, I realize this is upsetting, but it is not new information, it merely confirms what the goblins have suspected for some time. Now that we have a secondary source confirming what the statistical data has been implying we can move forward with more confidence.”

“Ok, so you are not surprised by this. You said this isn’t new information. Why didn’t anyone tell me?”

Gerald raised an eyebrow and gave a skeptical look at Harry. Magical portraits could be remarkably lifelike at times. “From my briefing with the Director before they moved this frame into your trunk I was under the impression that he had told you. Back when you had first met in fact.”

“No, I’m pretty sure I’d have remembered that. He said stuff about the headmaster being, um, sneaky I guess? And something about him being a thief from orphans – I remember that because I think the Director was trying to say he might steal from me since I’m an orphan – but he didn’t say anything about him trying to kill me.”

“Hm, perhaps it was an issue with cultural differences. I have noticed over the years that the goblins and wizards have very different ways of looking at the world, and this can cause miscommunication on the simplest of topics. Nonetheless, the fact of the matter is that the goblins suspect that Dumbledore steals not only the funds, but also the lives from orphans. And they believed that you fit the profile, as it were, that he seems to go after. But he is very careful, and there is never any hint of fraud in the financial paperwork, and never any direct tie between him and the deaths, so they felt it was not worth the political uproar that would have followed you not attending Hogwarts because of Dumbledore. He is unlikely in the extreme to come after you with a wand. His modus operandi is much more along the lines of setting you up for a convenient accident, perhaps something with that third floor corridor you spoke of after the Opening Feast. I certainly can’t imagine why a school would have something explicitly designed to deliver a, how did you say he phrased it, ‘a most painful death’, unless there was a hope that someone would indeed die there. And unfortunately, you are the most likely candidate for that hope, if that is indeed what he is trying to accomplish.”

Harry was glad he was already sitting down, or he might have fallen over. He was eleven. And he already had one insanely powerful wizard out there who had tried to kill him. Now apparently there were two. Which his allies had already known, but apparently he hadn’t understood when they had told him so.

“I’m not going to survive to see twelve at this rate.”

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxo

Harry trooped down the lawn towards Hagrid’s hut. He **had** received an invitation to tea via owl post at this morning’s breakfast, as Professor Snape had thought, and with Professor Snape’s warning in mind that he could listen to stories but not try to duplicate anything he heard, he decided there was nothing wrong with keeping the meeting. And since he had accepted already, Hagrid might wonder if he just didn’t show. Harry had asked Justin and Ernie if they wanted to come along as part of his half formed plans to spend more time with his dorm mates, but they both had already arranged to meet up with some first year Ravenclaws in the library and get the weekend homework started.

Harry arrived at the hut and knocked on the door, only to be startled by the very loud barking that immediately started up.

“Here now Fang, get back you great lump. Back up then, now” came Hagrid’s bellow through the door.

Harry was continuing to back up too. That was a dog, and it sounded like a big dog, and Harry did NOT have good memories of anything dog like. Ripper had scratched and bit him more times than he cared to remember, it was always painful, and that was only a small dog. Harry didn’t want to think what being attacked by a dog of a size to match Hagrid would feel like, or what it would leave him looking like. He had managed to stay out of the hospital wing so far this year (all one month of it but still) and wanted to keep it that way.

The goblins had told him that he would be fine sleeping in the dorms because he had roommates and there was a record of any teacher other than the Head of House that entered the various dorms so there could be questions if the Headmaster tried to get him there while he was asleep, but the hospital wing was open to anyone at any time, and they weren’t sure what monitoring was in place. It would be loads easier for the headmaster to get to him if he had to sleep overnight in the infirmary and even if he didn’t need an overnight stay, the school nurse might be able to find traces of some of the healing the goblins had done. If that happened and the headmaster found out it would certainly make him suspicious as to how and why said healing had taken place.

The headmaster was no fool and had to be aware the goblins didn’t like or trust him very much – especially if the headmaster could read minds when he looked at someone! And wasn’t that just icing on the cake. The immensely powerful (magically and legally) wizard who was trying to kill him could pluck thoughts out of his head by looking in his eyes. How was he supposed to fight that? And even if there was a way to fight it – involving meditation of all things and that was not going to be fun, it would probably take time to get good at it. And great, he had yet another thing to learn. There was only so much his brain could hold.

“HARRY! You came!”

‘Oh, I really should not let myself get lost in my head.’ Harry looked up to see that the door to Hagrid’s hut was open with the large groundskeeper filling the opening. A goofy looking dog’s head was pushing out on the side, leaving a wet trail of drool all down Hagrid’s trousers. ‘Showtime. I think it will be nice to hear more about my dad, if Professor Snape is correct, but Hagrid is so nice. It seems mean for the headmaster to use him like this. If the Professor is right.’ “Of course I came, Hagrid, I said I would.”

Xoxoxoxoxo

“Young Sir”

Harry looked around for who might be calling him. He was alone in the hallway trudging back to the dorms after meeting with Hagrid. Dinner wasn’t for a bit, and he wanted to change clothes before heading to the Great Hall. Fang may not have been a vicious attack dog, but if you spent much time around him you could end up drowning in the amount of drool he gave off.

“Over here on the wall, Sir. I was asked to give you a message when I could catch you alone.”

Harry turned to the side to see a painting with a young girl standing amid a field of flowers. The girl was staring right at him with a small smile. Well this was different, as while he’d realized the people in paintings moved, he hadn’t realized they were truly interactive like Gerald, but hey, magic. “Okay,” Harry replied. He looked up and down the corridor. This was one of the longer and straighter corridors in the path down to the entrance to the Sett, and he could not see anyone coming from either direction. “It looks clear for a minute. What is the message?”

“When you have a bit of free time, and can get away alone, please go to the sixth floor and enter the last classroom on the lake side of the castle. That classroom isn’t used currently and should be empty whenever you have a chance to go. There is a door in the back of the classroom leading to an office. Go into the office and give the portrait that hangs there your name. He will pass on that you are available and someone else will come to speak to you shortly thereafter. That’s the message, but I’m going add to please do this as soon as you can as the Tristan has committed to staying there until you make it, and will be somewhat bored until you do. I’ll visit with him occasionally so he won’t be completely alone, but since this is supposed to be rather hush he isn’t exactly sending out invitations so others don’t realize this is happening, and I’ll probably be the only one that does. Normally Tristan would go visiting other paintings since his is in an abandoned area with really nothing to see. His frame doesn’t even face the window so he doesn’t get any variation in view unless he leaves, which he won’t until you make it there.” The girl looked at Harry with a pleading look on her face. It really was amazing how real the image was.

“Um, that’s a really weird request. Who wants to talk to me?”

“I wasn’t told. I was just asked to pass the message along. Tristan didn’t really even want to ask me to do that but it would be odd for him to be here all the time just waiting for you to be here alone, whereas this is my home painting so it’s perfectly natural. He felt getting me involved in a minor way and asking for discretion was less risky than someone asking why he was never at his home frame.”

Harry was now even more confused – who would care where painted people spent time after all – but like many things in the magical world he would just accept it for now.

After thinking a minute Harry replied, “Okay, well, I need to get changed and get to dinner right now, and I’ve got some other things I have planned this weekend, but I’ll see about getting there sometime next weekend. During the week is really too scheduled to get away unnoticed. So you can tell your friend he doesn’t have to worry about it until then. I can’t give an exact time as it depends on when my house year mates want to get together to work on homework; we don’t have a set time on the weekends the way we do in the evenings.” After all, having just been warned about not being reckless that morning, he figured he’d better at least ask Gerald’s (and through him the goblins’) opinion before going off into what was described as an unused and probably empty part of the castle to meet with someone that he didn’t know.

Xoxoxoxoxox

The next Sunday morning Harry’s alarm went off at 5:30AM. Yawning a bit as he had stayed up later than he had intended playing a game of exploding snap in the common room, he climbed into the training room in his trunk and quickly changed from his nightwear to his exercise clothing. “Good morning, Gerald.”

“Good morning, young Sir. And a fine morning it is currently. I have a message from Professor Snape for you.”

Harry blinked. “Okay. What’s the message?”

Gerald raised an eyebrow at him.

“Right, sorry. Start over. Okay, I would be pleased to hear the message, if you would be so kind.”

“Better. Just because your classmates have appalling verbal manners does not mean you should emulate them. Now, after our conversation last Friday evening I informed the goblins of the requested meeting up on the 6th floor corridor. They sent a message to Professor Snape along with some routine transaction information – we were lucky it’s the start of the month so there was a planned communication already scheduled for this past Wed so they were able to just add it on – and he managed to get a reply back late yesterday. He is amazed that you took his warnings seriously,”

‘Of course he is,’ thought Harry.

“and didn’t just run off immediately last Friday night. He isn’t sure it isn’t a trap, particularly since the portrait is supposed to fetch someone else that might be a painting, and might be a living person, with no indication of which it will be. But you are technically Lord Slytherin, even though no Potter has formally accepted the title in several generations, and he speculated that your signing the reaffirmation treaty with the goblins could have triggered some magical change in the castle since the original Lord Slytherin was a founder. In any case, he has decided you should go to this meeting but not without his support. To that end you are instructed to go to the Great Hall at 8AM this morning, and spend 30 minutes eating. Once you are finished breakfast, make your way to the office as instructed. As long as you ensure you do not leave the Great Hall before 8:30AM, and do not dally and leave much after 8:30AM, the Professor will ensure he is in a position to monitor the interaction without being observed so he can provide assistance should it be required.”

“He wants me to go to breakfast at 8AM? No one goes to breakfast that early on Sunday mornings. Isn’t that going to be seen as strange?”

“Contrary to popular belief, there are students capable of voluntary movement in the early mornings and I am sure he would not have instructed you to go at that time if it would be a concern. The fact that there will not be many students out and about was probably a factor in his decision to choose that time as you are less likely to be observed heading into an abandoned area where you could be attacked in private. It will keep your doings confidential and reduce the risk from ad hoc attacks.”

“I really don’t think there are people hanging around the castle just waiting for a chance to attack me.”

“That may be, but if you plan for it regardless it will not take you by surprise should it occur.”

Harry thought Gerald was paranoid, but wasn’t willing to get into an argument about it. “What do you want me to work on today?”

“I think we should continue your meditation exercises. Be sure to set an alarm, as if you are not fully awake calming your mind might lead you to doze off, but I think working on it when you are in such a state, still waking up but not yet fully engaged, will make it easier for you to let go of your conscious thoughts; something you have been struggling with in the two sessions we’ve managed so far.

So remember, the first step in meditation is to be in a calm, private setting where you will not be interrupted, which you have here, wearing comfortable clothing that will not distract you. Take a few minutes and go through your normal stretching routine, as if you were preparing for our combat exercises, to get your muscles loose. Once that is done, normally you would sit in a comfortable position, but I think today I will have you start with you lying on the floor on your back to mimic a sleeping position to help your mind stay calm. We can move back to a seated mediation once you have the basics down.”

As Gerald went through the steps of beginner meditation with him again for the third time this week, Harry sighed and wondered how many more things he was going to have to learn on top of the regular class load. At least this lesson didn’t involve getting scolded or called a dunderhead.

Xoxoxoxox

“Hello? Hello, Tristan?” Harry called out as he entered the door off the empty classroom he had been directed to by the lady in the portrait a week ago. “Are you here?”

“My goodness are you an early riser. I was not expecting you to arrive so early of a morning. For forms sake, could you confirm your name for me young man?” came a voice from the painting on the wall.

“Um, I’m Harry Potter. I was told you were supposed to let someone know I’m here?”

“Yes, there is a portrait that wishes to discuss certain things with you. Please wait just a few moments,” Tristan replied, and walked out of his frame.

Harry looked around the room he was in while he waited. There was a desk with one chair behind it and two chairs in front of it. The chairs he could see fully were basic wooden chairs with no cushions. There was a small bookcase behind the desk, and a few volumes lying scattered on the shelves. Everything was covered in a small layer of dust and looked like it hadn’t been touched in years.

“Mr. Potter, thank you for coming to meet me. I am sure you have questions, and I am willing to try to answer what I can, but I need to make you aware of something first.”

Harry turned to see a new figure showing in the portrait frame on the wall. It was hard to tell in a painting, but he seemed to be a tall man, dressed in a high collared black robe with silver embroidery and buttons. A small snake was also embroidered on the front of the robe. He had a sharply beaked nose, more so even than Professor Snape’s, and dark hair and beard.

“My name is Phineas Nigellus Black. I was in my life a headmaster of this school and as such I have a portrait on permanent display in the headmaster’s office. I therefore see and hear a great deal of information. The current headmaster, Dumbledore, has in his possession an invisibility cloak that rightfully belongs to you. It is an heirloom of your family, child, and it appears that the headmaster does intend to return it, but with a tracking charm attached. I was made aware of this late last month when he was applying the charm work. He was not in the office; he was in his chambers, but I do not think he realized he had not fully closed the door to his personal quarters before he started trying to charm the cloak, because when his initial attempt or attempts at the charm failed, his voice raised enough to be heard down in the office. He was most upset that his charms were not adhering to the cloak. He quieted back down quickly so I am not sure if he found a way to make it work or not, but you should be wary of using the cloak until you have a chance to have it inspected.” With that final statement, the image fell silent, and simply stood in the frame looking at Harry. In turn, Harry stood looking back, thinking about what he was told. ‘Why would the portrait feel obligated to share this information? Well, he said he would answer questions.’ “Um, okay. I appreciate you letting me know. I think my first question is, why are you letting me know? I mean, thanks, but why?”

“Portraits of former headmasters of the school have a charge. We are here to advise the current headmaster of course, that is why our primary frames are hung in the headmaster’s office, but we are part of the castle. Unlike a normal portrait, we are under a geas that requires us to report information that indicates severe danger to one or more students. Normally that information would be reported to the headmaster, but I am sure you see the issue with that.” Headmaster Black paused in his speaking to look at Harry with an arched eyebrow. ‘Wow. I wonder if he ever met Gerald.’ “Since you are the one affected, the other portraits and I decided you would have to be informed. Since You and I are related distantly through your father’s mother, and share another tie through your godfather, faithless though he proved to be, I was the one chosen to pass along the information. Now the Headmaster should be eating his breakfast but will be returning to his office at some point in the near future so if you have any further questions ask them quickly. While we are not bound to stay in our primary frames, it is not normal for us to leave unless the current headmaster requests we take a message somewhere.”

“I have a question.” Harry jumped as Professor Snape seeming appeared out of nothing at the back of the room and stepped forward to stand next to him. “If you are under a geas to report information that can cause danger to a student, and have the ability to bypass reporting it to the headmaster if he is involved, why haven’t you reported what the headmaster is doing in the third floor corridor to anyone? That certainly constitutes severe danger, and to multiple students.”

Phineas reared back in his frame. “Ever the spy then? Will you be obliviating the lad before reporting back to your master? You will find it harder to remove the knowledge from me and-“

“Headmaster Black, Professor Snape is here because I told him about it, and he thought this meeting could be a ruse to get me alone and hurt me. He’s doing the same thing as you, protecting me.” Harry turned to Professor Snape. “But won’t this be a problem for you? I thought it was important that no one knew you were helping me.”

“If the portraits can bypass their need to report to the headmaster when he is the cause of the danger, this one should easily be able to avoid reporting this meeting to the headmaster that is actively trying to get you killed. And he seems to have at least some idea of stealth, crude though his methods are.”

“CRUDE, you call my methods crude? You double crossing-”

As the two continued to go back and forth insulting each other Harry leaned back against the desk and waited. Hopefully eventually they would remember he was here and he could ask a few more questions. It was nice to know he had help in the castle. It would just be nice if it was nicer help.


	14. Halloween Part One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fall progresses. Harry is settling into Hogwarts and beginning to feel like he has a handle on things. We all know that's not going to last, right?

As he settled into his bed and prepared to practice meditation techniques, Harry reflected on the conversation between Professor Snape, former Headmaster Black, and himself that had taken place once the Professor and former Headmaster had finished yelling at each other. The portraits couldn’t report the activity in the third floor corridor because they hadn’t heard about it – Albus never discussed it in his office and there were no portraits in that section of the castle right now; the Headmaster had had them all removed. That caused Professor Snape to ask for a follow up meeting with Headmaster Black that Harry wouldn’t need to be at, as there were things he felt needed sharing that did not directly involve Harry, but did involve potential danger to the students overall. As for Harry’s question on why he was being warned directly about his cloak, apparently while the current headmaster was fairly careful not to say or do anything directly incriminating in front of the portraits, there was a history of student deaths that seemed to correlate to students that the Headmaster had an interest in. Nothing firm, nothing actionable in and of itself, but enough that when it was clear Dumbledore was adding tracking charms to something owned by a student it raised concerns and the portraits decided it warranted a warning.

Basically what it came down to was that they had nothing concrete enough to take to the magical police, especially since Dumbledore had such as high reputation and was so well respected, so they had decided among themselves to warn Harry directly. Which answered Harry’s biggest question of why all the sneaking around to notify Harry directly but in private was required; if they were geased to report danger to students Harry would think they would report it to other teachers or other authority if the headmaster himself was a problem, but they didn’t think anything would come of that and it was likely to get back to Dumbledore and warn him his activities were being watched.

Harry hadn’t asked if the portrait was aware about the treaty with the goblins he had signed in August, and hadn’t mentioned anything about being considered Lord Slytherin, since the explanation of why he was warned didn’t involve those facts.

‘This is so confusing. Goblins don’t trust the Headmaster. Magical portraits of former Headmasters don’t trust him. Professor Snape doesn’t trust him. But apparently everyone else treats him like the second coming of Merlin. If there is anyone else that has questions they don’t talk about them, which makes it really hard to get anyone to listen to the concerns because you don’t know who will have an open mind and who will just run to Dumbledore and tattle.’

Harry shook his head and closed his eyes. Thinking about it wasn’t going to help him clear his mind, or get to sleep, and his alarm was going to go off in way too short a time as it was. He fell asleep wondering if or how Professor Snape was going to get the portraits to report about whatever was going on in the third floor corridor that no one was supposed to go to. And what the fallout would be if the portraits reported on a danger that they weren’t supposed to know about.

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

October was flowing by pretty smoothly compared to the first few weeks of term. Harry had settled in to a routine, studying with his dorm mates a few nights a week, meeting up with Hermione one or two afternoons in the library to study and catch up, and of course the ongoing training sessions on fighting and Occlumency he had with Gerald. The main outstanding change was the start of the weekly flying lessons for first years now that they had gotten settled in the academic class schedule.

Harry LOVED flying, and had convinced Madam Hooch that even though he was a natural on a broom he wanted to continue with the weekly lessons so he had access to a broom and flying time with a teacher present. She had offered to sign off on his ability to handle a broom after his first lesson since he was clearly a natural, which would let him fly unsupervised on a school broom whenever he had a free period, but Harry told her he would really like more time in the class first since he had never been on a broom before. This had the added benefit of letting him work with Hermione, since she was very uncomfortable on a broom. And last (but certainly not least!) on the list reasons for staying in the weekly class for his flying time, was something he figured he didn’t need Professor Snape or Gerald to tell him. Namely that borrowing one of the old, rickety brooms outside of class time to go fly on his own was an invitation for someone arrange an ‘accident’ for him. He wasn’t that thick!

Not that it had stopped either of them from giving him a lecture about never going flying on his own anyway. Gerald’s lecture was given during a morning fighting practice, and Professor Snape’s was given during a ‘detention’ assigned because Harry had supposedly dropped his sample vial of potion on the floor instead of putting on the desk when turning it in. In reality, in the potions class the morning after the first flying lesson Professor Snape had nudged his vial off the edge of the desk as Harry placed it down to give him an excuse to give the detention so he could lecture in private, but at least he hadn’t actually failed Harry on the assignment like he threatened when it happened.

Xoxoxoxoxoxox

“Excuse me,” Harry said as he came up to a young female student in the corridor outside the Gryffindor dorm. “Could you see if Hermione Granger is in the tower, and if she is, could you ask her if she is going to make it to the library before the feast tonight? We were supposed to meet up after lunch to work on the Transfiguration essay, but she didn’t show.”

“Oh, hi, you’re Harry Potter! Hi. I’m Lavender Brown. It’s really nice to meet you. I mean I’ve seen you in class, but I’ve never really talked to you. It’s nice to meet you.”

“Um. Thanks. It’s nice to meet you too. But my question, could you see if Hermione is in the dorm for me? We were supposed to meet…”

“Oh. Oh! I don’t know if Hermione’s going to make your meeting, and I already know she’s not in the tower; she’s been in the 2nd floor bathroom since Charms class this morning. She got really upset by something Ron Weasley said after class and has been hiding in there crying ever since.”

“What! OK. I appreciate you letting me know. Thanks.”

‘Well that’s not right. Now how do I get Hermione out of the bathroom?’

Harry made his way back down the stairs. As he came off the main stair case on the ground floor he saw Susan Bones, another Hufflepuff first year he knew through the regular study sessions in the Sett, heading his way.

“Oh, hey, Susan! Hi! Um, can I ask … Where are you going?”

“Hi Harry, I’m headed up to the owlery to mail my aunt my weekly letter.”

“Could I ask you for a favor first?”

“What’s the favor?”

“My friend Hermione and I were supposed to meet up in the library a while ago and she never showed. I found out she is in the girl’s bathroom off the Charms corridor. She’s supposedly been there all morning because one of other Gryffindors upset her right after they had Charms. I can’t go in after her; it’s the **girl’s** bathroom. But I’m really worried about her, and I want to talk to her and make sure she’s okay. Could you go and ask her to see if she’ll come out to talk to me?” Harry hated having to ask anyone for a favor, but if Hermione had been hiding all afternoon she must have skipped at least one class, and that meant she was really upset.

“I suppose I could do that.”

“I’ll come with you and wait outside the bathroom while you ask her. Please make sure to let her know while if she wants to talk about what got her upset I’d be happy to talk to her about it, she doesn’t have to if she doesn’t want to. I just want to make sure she’s all right.” Harry added as they made their way up the staircase and into the right corridor.

“Wait here, I’ll see if I can get her to come out and talk to you.”

Harry leaned up against the wall next to the bathroom door to wait. There wasn’t much traffic through the castle right now as classes were done for the day and the feast wouldn’t start for another few hours.

“Harry? You came looking for me?” Hermione’s eyes were red and swollen, and her face still blotchy from her crying. Susan squeezed past Hermione (who had stopped in the bathroom doorway) and headed back down the corridor.

“Thanks, Susan!” Harry called out after her.

“No problem, Harry, I’ll see you later for the feast,” came the reply floating back.

“Hey, Hermione. I thought we were meeting up today,” said Harry calmly as her turned back to face his friend, not mentioning her face or asking about her crying. He hadn’t had a lot of (or any) practice talking with upset girls his age, but he remembered an etiquette lesson with Gerald where he learned that it was considered rude to ask someone directly what was bothering them unless they brought it up first, or they were a really close confidant. While he did consider Hermione a friend, he couldn’t say they were that close. At least not yet.

Sniffling a little bit, Hermione bit her lip and didn’t say anything right away. Harry just kept silent, giving her time to think about what she wanted to say. After a minute or so she said “I’m sorry I didn’t show up like I promised. I didn’t really think you’d miss me. You’ve been doing fine with your essays for over a week now. I think you understand how to organize your thoughts and structure your writing now so it’s all clear. You don’t really need my help anymore.” Hermione’s voice got quieter as she spoke, until she was nearly whispering when she finished.

“That doesn’t really matter Hermione. Even if I didn’t think I needed your help, and just so you know, I will always appreciate you taking a look at my homework if for nothing else than to see if I did a …what’s that word Professor Snape uses … ah yes, to see if I was a dunderhead and forgot something important or messed up in a stupid way somewhere and didn’t catch it myself. Because hey, anyone can have a stupid moment and not catch it.

But even if I didn’t think I needed your help with homework and stuff, I’d still miss you because you’re my friend and since we aren’t in the same house our meet ups in the library are really the only time I get to spend time with you. If you think it’s just because you help me with homework, then we need to start making plans some times to meet outside the library and for something other than school work because that is not true, and I don’t want you to feel that way. Not sure what we could do as it’s not like there are playgrounds around here, and the weather is getting too bad for that in any case, and I’ve never seen anyone who wasn’t in Hufflepuff in our common room and I get the feeling other houses aren’t supposed to go to other common rooms – I mean we got a lecture the first night about protecting the secret of the entrance so leading someone else in would kinda be in violation of that and all - but we need to figure something out. Because you mean more to me than just helping me with homework, and I don’t think you get that.” Harry knew he was rambling on, really just thinking out loud at this point as he spoke but he wanted to make sure Hermione understood he was serious about spending time with her, even if he wasn’t sure how to make it happen yet.

“I…I don’t know what to say. No one has ever wanted to just spend time with me. Anytime someone tried to say they were my friend before it was always just about helping them with school stuff – no one ever wanted to do anything other than school stuff. When I would only help and not do it for them whoever said they were my friend stopped spending time with me altogether so I gave up. I know you said you wanted to be my friend, but you’re Harry Potter. You have a ton of people who would love to be your friend and-“

“Okay, let’s just move this out of the corridor. We do need to talk about this, and I’d rather not anyone just come along and overhear. I think there won’t be anyone in the charms classroom right now.” Harry interrupted. He was going to have to explain again about the books being wrong, and wanted to make sure she understood he wasn’t looking for a fan, he was looking for a friend.

Harry had enough of people making assumptions about him – like Draco Malfoy who sniggered every day when he saw Harry for the first time and clearly bought into the idea that the Hufflepuff House was for duffers. (It was something that was a fairly regular topic of discussion in the common room in the evening since that viewpoint tended to annoy everyone in the house, including Professor Sprout.) Or like Ron Weasley; the boy had not made any better impression on Harry in the weeks since they’d met on the train. Ron seemed personally offended that Harry wasn’t in his house, and had called Harry a coward not brave enough for Gryffindor after the first class he’d had with the lions back at the start of the term. They hadn’t really spoken since, but while Weasley didn’t outright snigger like Malfoy, he did get an upset or angry expression anytime Harry did anything that got Hufflepuff points in their shared classes. And this was the boy who had upset his friend. Harry thought he might have to do something about Ron Weasley at some point. But that was for another day. Today he needed to talk to Hermione, and preferably without an audience.

“Here, I was right, there’s no one in here. We can sit and talk in private.” Harry ushered Hermione into the charms classroom and to a pair of desks by closest to the door. “Now, you were saying that everyone you knew in the past only spent time with you to get help with homework, right? Didn’t you say the first time we met that you hadn’t had friends before?”

“Yes,” Hermione said in a small voice.

“So those people weren’t friends. Didn’t I say I wanted to be your friend?”

“Yes…But those people said they wanted to be my friend at first too!” came the outburst after a moment. As soon as she finished speaking Hermione pulled back in the chair and hunched her shoulders. Harry recognized that behavior. It was one he used to do when protesting something unfair from a teacher and didn’t expect to be listened to.

“Okay, I can understand that. I’m a little upset that you think I’d be like those others, but we have spent our time together pretty much just on school work, and we did originally meet in the library while doing research, so I can see why you might think that. But I need you to understand that I want to truly be your friend. I am not the person you’ve read about. I told you those books were wrong-”

“And I get that, I know you’re not that person and didn’t grow up like that, but everyone still wants to be your friend, so why would you want to be my friend if I can’t do anything for you?”

Harry sighed. This was going to be tougher than he thought. “Okay, so I think you are interesting. You are reading stuff other than what we are supposed to for class, and you want to learn more about the magical world. You are willing to ask questions, and while you had some odd ideas on what I would be like based on what you had read about me, you seem willing to accept it when I told you the books were wrong.

But most important, you want to be friends with Harry. Not Harry Potter. See, most of those people who want to be my friend don’t really want to be my friend. They want to be friends with someone that isn’t real. The person they think I am because of the books. And that’s not who I am. I figured since you were used to people who said they wanted to be your friend because they wanted you to do their homework you’d understand that better than some of the others. I have one good guy friend I met on the platform who is muggleborn so he doesn’t really get the ‘Boy-Who-Lived’ thing. I’ve made some other casual friends in my House like Susan because they see me more often and Hufflepuff is really big on doing things together, but even there I get some prats who don’t want to accept that I’m not who they think I am and get upset when I don’t react the way they expect or want.

But you are the only person not in my house that I can really call a friend right now. And that’s important to me.”

“Wow Harry. I don’t really know what to say. I mean, I’m sorry you have to deal with prats, but they are everywhere. I didn’t really think about what it might mean for you to try and make friends. I mean, I read about you once I bought the books but didn’t really think about it too much. I didn’t grow up with it, and it didn’t make a big impact. It must be like trying to find friends when you’re a star – like that kid from that Christmas movie last year. Everyone who sees him is going to know his name and probably think that he’s that kid he played. But that’s not him, that’s a character.”

Harry blinked at his friend. The Dursley’s had never taken him to a movie in a theater, and while they watched them on the telly sometimes, Harry had rarely been allowed to stay in the room. And though he could often hear enough of the films or shows to have an idea of what was going on because Vernon kept the volume on earsplitting levels, if it had been a new movie in the theater it wouldn’t have been shown on the telly yet since it was a holiday movie. And a description of ‘that kid from the Christmas movie’ could be anyone. Pretty much every Christmas movie he’d heard through the cupboard door seemed to have a kid somewhere. “I have no idea what you are talking about.”

“You know, like type casting. Thinking an actor is the role, and not seeing them as a separate person.”

This seemed like a very weird concept to Harry. “Still pretty clueless over here as to what you are actually saying, but I get that it means something to you and that you’ve made a connection so I’m going to go with it and agree you’re right.”

Hermione stamped her foot. “Harry, you’re not supposed to just agree if you don’t understand! That’s not right!”

‘Well, at least she’s not crying any longer…’ Harry thought as he let Hermione’s rant wash over him.

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxo

The feast was in full swing. The Great Hall decorated with pumpkins and streamers, and the table groaning under the weight of the food. Harry wasn’t really feeling the celebration – this was the night he had lost his parents after all, even if he didn’t remember them – but had come along with the rest of his House because that’s what Hufflepuff did. He sat on the end so he could make his way out as soon as it was allowed and kept pretty quiet.

Hermione had calmed down as they talked in the Charms classroom earlier, but she had decided she really wasn’t up to the feast. Her parents wouldn’t want her overloading on sugar, and from what she’d heard that was really the bulk of what was offered that night – even the food food (as opposed to puddings and candy) were on the sweet side, things like honey glazed carrots and maple glazed ham - so she told Harry she was going to grab a book from the library and read in her dorm room for the evening. Harry knew the menu would not be the best to keep to the meal plan from the goblin healers he was still following, and of course he wasn’t in a celebratory mood for the day, so he wished he could have done the same, but feast days were considered an all house thing in Hufflepuff where the students all gathered together as a group in the Sett and went to the Great Hall together to show their unity.

Harry had thought it was neat when he first heard about it, but only until he realized the first feast after the opening feast would be on Halloween. He’d thought about asking Professor Sprout if he could skip, but decided he didn’t want to ask for special treatment. Smith was already snotty enough to him in the dorms as it was without Harry trading on his Boy-Who-Lived reputation. He didn’t want to make it worse.

‘I think it would be okay to head out now. The main meal swapped out for desserts a little while ago, and it doesn’t look like there are going to be any announcements the way there were at the opening feast. And come to think of it, the announcements then were made before the feast started, so I have to think there won’t be any tonight. So I think-‘

Harry’s thoughts came to a crashing halt along with the crashing of the main hall doors being flung open. Professor Quirrell staggered through the now open doors with every eye in the Great Hall fixed upon him.

“TROLL! Troll in the dungeon. Thought you ought to know,” he gasped out, just before collapsing to the floor in a dead faint.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You all realized the chapter was going to end there when I called it part one, right?


	15. Halloween Part Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The rest of Halloween.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am sorry for the long hiatus between chapters, but I was just not that interested in writing for several months. But the muse seems to have gotten a kick start and not only is this being posted, the next chapter is actually nearly done, so it should be up reasonably soon. No specific date as I do have to revise it a bit as I realized I created a plot issue and have to go back and rewrite part of it. But nothing like the gap between the last chapter and now.

The Great Hall erupted in pandemonium. Students were yelling and screaming, some of them falling off the benches as they all tried to move at once.

“SILENCE!” Dumbledore stood at the head table and tried to calm the students down. “Prefects, gather your housemates and escort them to the common rooms. The feast will be split up and moved so each house can continue to celebrate while the teachers deal with this.”

‘But we have to go towards the dungeon to get to our common room. And the Slytherin common room is actually in the dungeon. He’s sending us into the path of the troll!’ Harry moved quickly to grab Gabriel, the seventh year prefect. “Gabe, sending us and the Slytherins to our common rooms means we are going to be heading right to where the troll was spotted. That makes no sense, unless you can deal with a troll,” he said urgently.

Gabriel started as Harry grabbed his arm, but as soon as he heard what Harry was saying, he raised his wand and sent off a shower of red sparks. All the Hufflepuffs stopped moving and looked at him, as did most of the rest of the students. He then put his wand to his throat and murmured a spell Harry couldn’t hear, but the effect was obvious as soon as Gabriel continued to speak. “It was just pointed out to me that the troll was spotted in the dungeons, so we and the Slytherins should not go to our common rooms as we could end up running directly into the troll’s path. If the prefects would perform a check to ensure all students are accounted for, we can determine the best course of action. Thank you.” He then put his wand to his throat again and murmured “Quietus”. His voice now back to normal volume, Gerald spoke briefly to the other seventh year prefect. “Make sure we have a full head count. Everyone came to the feast, and I didn’t see anyone leave, but best to be sure no one bolted out in the initial confusion. He then turned to face Harry again. “Thanks Harry, that was a good catch,” he said. “I think we were all just too caught up in the moment…”

“No Albus!” At the sudden shout rising over the now quieter room, both Harry and Gabriel turned to look at the head table where Professor Snape was clearly arguing with the Headmaster, albeit no longer loud enough to be heard at the back of the Great Hall. Whatever Professor Snape was saying, it was clear the Headmaster was not happy about it. After a moment, the Professor put his wand to his throat as Gabriel had done earlier. “Slytherin Prefects, you will also perform a head count and keep our House in the Great Hall for now. Make a list of any missing students and try to determine their current whereabouts.” He ended the spell and glared at the fuming Headmaster.

Harry wondered what had the Headmaster so upset, but before he had much time to think about it, another voice rang out above the continued low rumble of the students getting sorted. “Gryffindor, follow the same procedures – headcount by year and stay in the Hall until cleared. Identify any missing students so we can check for them as this situation is dealt with,” came Professor McGonagall’s voice, followed immediately by Professor Flitwick’s voice giving the same instructions to the Ravenclaws.

“Professor Quirrell, are you alright?” Harry turned to see an older Hufflepuff student kneeling on the floor next to the prone Defense professor, one hand on his shoulder. “Professor Quirrell? Should I get Madam Pomfrey for you?”

The man twitched, and then shrugged her hand off his shoulder as he sat up. “N-n-n-no. I-I-I’m fine. Thank y-y-y-you.”

“That’s good to hear,” came a brisk voice, and turning, Harry saw Professor McGonagall approaching. “It’s been decided that it makes more sense to have the students are stay here, so we are going to seal the Great Hall, leaving several of the teachers as guards with the rest searching in teams of three for the troll. We are working out which teachers will be in which role now; come with me back to the head table to be given your assignment. With that, she waved her wand toward the still open entrance. The doors closed with another bang, and there was a brief flash of light. “There, that should hold the doors against a troll, at least long enough for the teachers to respond.”

As Harry had turned back to look at Professor Quirrell as Professor McGonagall spoke, he saw a brief look of utter loathing or maybe hatred pass over the man’s face as he stood up, once again brushing aside the older Hufflepuff student who was still trying to assist him. But by the time he was fully straightened up, his expression was back to the vaguely earnest bland look that was normally on his face. ‘That was weird’ thought Harry. ‘I wonder that was about.’

Xoxoxoxoxoxo

About an hour later, even the most dedicated students had finished picking through the last of the desserts left behind, the tables had been cleared off, and many of the younger children were beginning to nod off as they sat waiting to be released. Some had already given in and had their heads down on the table, cushioned by their arms, as they tried to nap in the midst of the steady roar of voices that filled the hall. Students that stayed awake were exchanging ideas on what could be keeping the teachers away – ranging from the troll having killed them all to the troll leading them on a chase through the castle to one wag that offered the suggestion that the teachers could have abandoned them to go on vacation after defeating the troll.

The teachers that remained had stayed mostly by the head table talking in low tones, occasionally looking out over the hall to make sure everyone was still where they were supposed to be but mainly letting the prefects handle any questions or issues. The most pressing concern had been a few students who needed a bathroom shortly after the hall was sealed, but as Professor McGonagall was one of the teachers who stayed behind, she simply transfigured two private areas as temporary loos – one for boys and one for girls – and they had both had a small but steady line ever since. Harry didn’t want to think about the logistics of magical bathrooms and where the waste went, but of course his mind had gone there anyway. He decided after thinking about it a bit that it didn’t really matter, but he was determined to wait until they were released back to their houses to use any facilities.

A flicker of light attracted his attention. A small streak of light, shaped like some sort of animal came shooting through the closed doors and up to Professor McGonagall at the head table. It stayed there for a moment before dissolving. The Professor stood up and cleared her throat, looking around to catch the eyes of the various prefects in the room who immediately started to shush any students who had missed the incident and were still talking.

“Attention. The troll has been found and dealt with. All students are now cleared to return to their dormitories for the night. Prefects, as it is after curfew, please be sure to escort your housemates and ensure **all** of them make it back into the common rooms.” Her eyes were focused on her own house table, and two identical red haired students sitting in the middle as she finished her statement. The two students looked back with ‘who me’ expressions on their faces. The Professor’s expression firmed even more at that point, and her lips pursed like she was sucking on a lemon. Harry had heard about the terrible twins, and had seen some of the practical jokes they liked to play on other students. He tried to avoid them mostly, and Hufflepuff in general was usually not targeted too much. But you couldn’t be a student at Hogwarts and not know of the Weasley twins. Personally Harry thought they were a lot better than their brother Ron who was still hung up on the fact that Harry was not in Gryffindor, but Harry was way too busy to try to connect with students two years higher from another house. Not to mention that they seemed to prank people they were close to more often than just about anyone else, probably due to the fact they were convenient. Harry was having enough trouble finding time to keep up with his friends in Hufflepuff, plus Hermione, and his school work, and keeping up with the training in his trunk to add dealing with a constant stream of pranks to his days.

He had been intending to spend some time with Gerald this evening, but was too tired now to even think about it. He had figured out that he could bring his trunk behind his bed curtains at night so he wouldn’t have to worry about his dorm mates seeing him enter or leave the trunk as long as they thought he was in bed. Zach Smith had made fun of him for it of course, talking about how he must have a security blanket or a teddy bear or something that he was hiding, but Harry didn’t care. The reduced stress from not worrying about someone figuring out his trunk was not the standard student issue was well worth it. He was still careful to go extra early when using it in the mornings to avoid having Justin open his curtains to ‘wake him up’ and find him missing, but since he had almost been surprised one morning when Ernie had risen early needing the bathroom it was the best compromise he could come up with between keeping the trunk secret and still using it regularly.

Xoxoxoxoxox

Harry was sitting eating breakfast the next morning when he was startled by someone sitting next to him. Not that people didn’t sit next to him at meals, but normally it was his housemates, and normally whoever sat next to him didn’t grab him in a massive hug. Harry stiffened in shock. He couldn’t remember the last time anyone had hugged him. Or if anyone had **ever** hugged him for that matter. After a moment of sitting frozen in the embrace with brown hair half covering his face, he was released.

“Thank you, Harry. I didn’t know anything about the troll until Lavender and Parvati made it back to the dorm last night, but if you hadn’t come and gotten me I probably would have still been in that bathroom when it was wandering the halls. I could have been killed!” Hermione was still way closer than Harry was used to or really comfortable with, but he was getting used to the fact that she didn’t seem to have much personal space, at least with him. And the dead-earnest look on her face was actually kinda cute.

“Good morning, Hermione. I doubt you would have been killed since the troll was down in the dungeon area but…”

“NO! That’s just it, it’s fine now but apparently the teachers found the troll wandering around in the upper halls near that corridor and bathroom! It wasn’t down in the dungeon at all! The whole corridor was apparently all messed up when the Gryffindor students were walking back to the dorms. They said there was rubble on the floor and cracks in the walls and dents in some of the armor. It’s back to normal now like I said, but who knows what could have happened. If the troll had found me before the teachers found it I would have been in real trouble. So thank you.”

“Um. Wow. Okay. You’re welcome?” Harry didn’t really know how to respond to someone thanking him for saving their life. And the attention they were getting from others who were down early for breakfast was making him even more uncomfortable. “I’m glad you were safe. Really. But I think you are giving me too much credit for it.”

“Humph. You’re welcome he says. Are you sure? It sounded like you were asking me a question instead of actually accepting my thanks. Too much credit he says. Harry, I get you are not the type to put yourself forward, but you need to take the credit for what you do do when you do something. **You** came for me when no one else could be bothered. **You** got me out of that bathroom so I was safe in bed when there was a rampaging troll running around. And I really appreciate it. So thank you.” And she sat there with her arms crossed looking at him steadily after she finished.

Harry looked back, took a deep breath and tried again. “You’re welcome Hermione. I’m glad you were safe,” he managed in a much firmer tone of voice.

“Better.”

“Got yourself a fangirl, there, Potter?” came Smith’s annoying voice from behind them.

“No, Smith. Just a friend. A concept you don’t seem to be very familiar with.” Harry shot back. He was really tired of the way Smith had been snipping at him since school started. The boy seemed to think everyone in Hufflepuff should listen to him because he was descended from the house founder but he never had anything of actual importance to say. Mostly he complained. About classes, other students, the food, the teachers. Nothing but complaints. He probably got into Hufflepuff house not because of his ancestry but because none of the other ones would take him. And for whatever reason, he seemed to like complaining about and to Harry more than anyone else in their year.

Small titters from came from around them as the other students in the area reacted to Harry’s jibe. Smith stiffened and stalked further down the table to grab a seat. “That wasn’t very nice, Harry,” Hermione said softly, but she was clearly fighting off her own grin. “I’m going back to the Gryffindor table to eat before class, but I wanted to make sure to thank you before we got started in the day since we don’t have any classes together today.”

“Okay, talk to you later, Hermione.”

And just as she left, his owl Hedwig winged down to his plate with a note attached to her leg. “Good morning beautiful. What do you have for me there?”

Opening the unaddressed note, Harry stared in shock. No name was signed, but the handwriting was familiar from the scathing comments still being written on his potion essays (fewer comments than before he had asked Professor Sprout for help and then talked to Professor Snape granted, but the ones he did get were still scathing). Professor Snape had sent him a note that read ‘1 point to Hufflepuff for clear thinking and not rushing into danger like a Gryffindor hothead’. As Harry continued to stare in stunned amazement, the note shivered in his hand and crumbled away to dust. He wanted to turn and look at the Professor to make sure of what he had read as he could not believe it had been real, but knew better. He had gotten a point from the one professor notorious for never giving points outside of his house. Granted it was only 1 point, but that was like getting at least 10 points from any other teacher. Maybe more. Wow.

Xoxoxoxoxox

November rolled along and by the middle of the month Harry finally felt like he was really getting somewhere stable. He was doing decent in his classes – not the top of the class by any means, but most of his work was coming back with EEs with the occasional O or A. Gerald was pleased with how he was coming along with his mediation practice/basic Occulmency training and thought that he would be ready for some starting instruction on creating something called a mindscape soon, which was apparently the next step in protecting his mind from someone else reading his thoughts. He was also getting a lot smoother in his pole arms practice. He hadn’t hit himself or tripped up once in weeks! So naturally with his normal brand of luck, something had to come along to completely throw him off stride.

The day started as normal. It was one of his non morning training days, so he was able to sleep in a little. He got up and after getting ready went to breakfast with Justin. It was much easier now to keep up with his meal plan from Rathgrow as one of the older Hufflepuffs had introduced the first years to the kitchens and the house elves the week after Halloween. After Harry had gotten over his shock (mild, granted, because of his experiences with goblins but house elves were in another category entirely), he had spoken to some of the elves about the kinds of foods he was supposed to eating, as it was sometimes a challenge to find foods that fit his meal plan. As a result, the section of the Hufflepuff table that the first years sat at now always had plenty of fresh fruit at breakfast, along with plain yogurt, slices of whole grain toast, a few fruit spreads in different colored containers that indicated they didn’t have added sugar, and hard boiled eggs in addition to the bacon, sausage, fried eggs, and sugar laden marmalades etc. that filled the other tables at breakfast.

The selections at lunch and dinner had similar healthier selections along with the heavy grease laden food that appeared to have been the mainstay of the castle menus prior to Harry’s request. Several of the older students had taken to wandering down the table to enjoy the variety a few times a week, though no one in Hufflepuff other than Harry was consistent in eating just from the newer items provided. Hermione had also noticed and commented positively on the lighter, healthier selections and the elves must have heard her as the Gryffindor table was now also similarly supplied in the section their first years used.

After eating a decent breakfast and grabbing a piece of whole fruit for a morning snack, Harry had gone to class with his housemates, again as normal. But when Harry had finished classes for the day and was heading back to his dorm, the young lady in the portrait along the corridor to his common room called out to him once again.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Potter.”

“Oh, good afternoon Miss… I never did get your name fair maiden. My deepest apologies,” said Harry with a shallow bow to the portrait. Harry thought was a lot easier to practice his good manners with portraits than with his classmates. His classmates looked at him like he was mental, whereas the portraits tended to find it charming.

“Oh, that was lovely. Your apologies are accepted, of course.” The young lady curtsied in response to Harry’s bow as she spoke. “My name is Miranda, kind sir. Now for the message I was tasked to deliver - You are asked to visit the kitchens again at some point, preferably sooner rather than later and not in a group as you did in your recent visit. You should visit on your own.”

Harry blinked. “Um. Milady Miranda, begging your pardon, but who is asking that I go to the kitchens?”

“I don’t know with whom the request originated, but it was passed to me through Tristan, same as the previous message.”

“Thank you for conveying the message. It is greatly appreciated.”

‘Okay, that’s not weird at all. Really. The kitchens? Now what do I do?’


	16. A Series of Uncomfortable Conversations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry talks to different people. He does not enjoy it very much.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this chapter was mostly written before I posted the prior chapter. I finished it, started the next chapter to make sure I didn't need to go back and change anything (turns out this was a good thing because I did have to go back and make a change), and have decided that it is good to go. This means the next chapter is 3K+ words in and counting. Not sure when it will be finished or how long it will end of being, but I am well into writing it. But I will not be posting chapter 17 until I get the chapter 18 at least partially written, because I am finding that helps me keep everything on track better. So don't expect another chapter up this quickly, but it will come.

Harry returned to his common room and settled in to work on the day’s homework with his study group. Not every first year participated every day, but there were usually at least 3 students working at the assigned first year table any given evening, and they all shared resources and information. Harry thought it was neat to have assigned workspace for each year so there wasn’t fighting over the tables. Hermione frequently complained about never being able to spread out unless she could snag a table in the library because the tables in the Gryffindor common room were almost always being used by the upper years, and when they weren’t hogging the space most of the younger students were using the tables to play games.

Granted it was quiet complaining because it was during their meet ups in the library, but she did consider it a pain to have to lug her books down to the library anytime she wanted space to spread out while she cross referenced information in different books. Harry thought Hufflepuff’s system was much better. Each year had its own assigned space with 1 large table in the common room designed for group projects and study that was placed near the door to the quiet study room assigned to the same year. The quiet study room had 3 smaller tables, about the size of a desk but without drawers. The large year tables in the common room could be used for games but only if no students in the year needed it for homework or study, and the tables in the quiet rooms were solely for individual quiet work. It didn’t have to be school work per say; a student could use it to write a letter home for example, but the quiet room was for quiet work the same as the library. If for some reason all the tables in a year group’s assigned quiet study room were in use (which happened occasionally when a teacher gave a particular year a big assignment) then students could see if there was space in another year’s quiet room, with the understanding that if a student in the rooms assigned year needed the space before the borrowing student was finished the borrowing student would relocate. The prefects enforced these rules for the use of the tables and quiet rooms in the rare times where there was an argument between students.

As he worked, he thought about the request he had just received. There hadn’t been a specific time frame with this request other than ‘soon’, and the only beings Harry had seen in the kitchen were the elves. He hadn’t seen any portraits down there, though that didn’t mean there weren’t any. He figured this was something he should talk to Gerald about, and probably let Professor Snape know about as well. ‘Great, something else for them to talk to death to me about.’

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxo

“No, I think it is a bad idea for you to go alone, same as it was a bad idea for you to meet with Phineas alone,” stated Gerald later that evening, once Harry had relayed the request after he had retired for the night and could enter his trunk unobserved.

“But it’s not the same, Sir. When I was meeting with Headmaster Black it was in an unused classroom with no observers other than the one portrait. There are always house elves in the kitchen, so I’m not going to really be alone,” protested Harry. He had explained the most recent request, and immediately gotten into an argument with the portrait over the level of risk. “And other students regularly go to the kitchen. Just about anyone could walk in at any time, so it’s really not a good place for an ambush at all. Too many witnesses.” Harry was thinking about his intermittent lessons on strategy and pulling ideas from them to add to his arguments. He didn’t actually think he would convince Gerald that he didn’t need an escort, but was going to try anyway.

“Even if that is true, having back up is never a bad idea. You have enemies, one of whom has a great deal of power in this castle, and meeting an unknown person or persons on your own – and house elves do NOT count – is extremely unwise. I will pass a message along to be delivered to Professor Snape with the next scheduled communication, and he will determine when you will do this.” Gerald spoke this last sentence sternly, almost glaring at Harry from his frame.

Harry honestly didn’t see it as nearly as big a deal as the meeting in an unused, out of the way classroom had been. And since it was the middle of the month, and Gringotts communications were almost always sent at the end or beginning of a month, waiting for Professor Snape to get notified about this request would likely take weeks. But he kept his frustration to himself, knowing from the portrait’s tone of voice that he wasn’t going to change his mind no matter what Harry said.

‘Maybe I’ll test out by going with just one other person. Maybe whoever sent the message will be willing to talk to me or get me a more specific message if I’m just with one other person and not a crowd, even if I’m not alone.’

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

A few days later Harry decided to attempt his plan. “Hey Justin, want to stop off at the kitchen for snacks to bring back for our study session tomorrow? I think everyone would appreciate having something more substantial than sweet stashes if we are going to get a good start on that Charms project Professor Flitwick assigned,” Harry asked his friend as they walked back toward the Hufflepuff rooms after their last class Friday afternoon. “We could grab some pieces of whole fruit, some nuts, and some of that crunch mix stuff that is served at breakfast like cereal but is eaten dry. It would all keep fine overnight, and that way if anyone sleeps in past breakfast they would have something healthy to eat.”

“I still say it’s not natural for someone our age to be so concerned about eating healthy food,” came Justin’s good natured return. “But sure, that sounds like a plan. And that way I can sleep in and not have you bugging me.”

“I don’t bug you. I remind you. And trust me, Justin. If your doctor was anything close to my doctor, you’d make sure you’d eat healthy too.” Harry wasn’t going to even think about what Rathgrow’s reaction would be if he ignored the very specific meal plan he had been given. Because Rathgrow would know. And it would not be pretty. “Maybe I’ll remind you anyway.”

“That’s just cruel. You know, for all that you say your aunt never liked you, she still must have been good about making sure you kept regular hours, ate right, and made sure you knew how important it is to keep it that way before you left for Hogwarts. That has to count for something,” Justin commented, causing Harry to freeze up for a minute as they turned down the corridor toward the kitchen. After a moment Justin noticed he was now walking alone and turned around to face Harry, who was still standing stock still in the middle of the hallway.

“Harry?”

Harry blinked slowly at his friend. He hadn’t really remembered until then that he had told Justin his aunt didn’t like him back when they had first met. He mostly avoided talking about his family and his life before coming to Hogwarts with everyone at school.

“Harry? Are you okay?”

And Harry wasn’t really sure he was comfortable with the fact that Justin had clearly remembered what he had said all those weeks ago. For all that the goblins had told him over and over that the way he was treated wasn’t right and he had come to accept it in his thoughts, he was still coming to terms with accepting it in his emotions.

“Harry!” A shout of his name snapped him out of the almost fugue state he had been in.

“Yes Justin?”

“Geez, Harry. What the heck was that?” Justin’s tone was halfway between annoyed and concerned. “You were really out of it for a minute.”

“Nothing. It doesn’t matter. We should get going so we have time to get everything put away securely so **someone** doesn’t get to it before the study session.”

“You mean so Smith doesn’t get to it. And you should just store the stuff in your trunk. He can’t get in that after all.”

Harry froze again. “What? How do you know he can’t get in my trunk?”

“Because I heard him cursing about it a few weeks after school started. I thought you knew he’d tried to get in. You treat that trunk like some priceless heirloom or something. The rest of us keep our trunks sitting around in no specific place and knock them about any old way if we need to move them. You practically sleep with yours with keeping it so close to your bed that it’s inside your curtains at night, and I’ve never seen you kick it. You don’t even like to drag it – every time I’ve seen you move it in the dorm, which is rare, you either push it gently to a new spot or wrap your arms around it to lift it evenly, even though you can barely get your hands on both handles at once. It’s weird. I figured from what he was saying that you had some super special locks on it and you would have had some way to tell when someone tried to get in.”

Harry’s eyes widened in panic. His trunk was his lifeline, his connection back to the goblins and his main source of advice with Gerald. All his training stuff and his extra books were stored there. Anything he didn’t want lying about to show that he wasn’t a perfectly normal first year student. He hadn’t thought to ask if there was some way to track if someone tried to get into it, but he figured it was going to be a top priority question as soon as he could get into the trunk to ask Gerald. “Did he say why he was trying to get into my trunk?” asked Harry worriedly.

“Not really. He was just complaining as usual about you being so special and as part of it happened to make some comment about your trunk being locked up tighter than a Gringott’s vault.” There was a brief pause, and then Justin visibly squared his shoulders. “Harry, something’s going on with you. You have secrets, which is fine, everyone does, but it’s more than that. I mean, look at just the past few minutes. You blanked out for a few minutes, Merlin only knows why. You were really shaken up when I said Smith had tried to get into your trunk, more so than I would think is normal, and you spend way too much time alone for a Hufflepuff. I know you’ve spent more time in the common room and study groups than you did the first month or so, but you get these looks sometimes…Sometimes the most common of things make you … I don’t know how to put it. But it’s like you never spent any time with other people before. Like you don’t know how to deal with other kids your own age. I also remember the look on your face when your friend Granger hugged you a few weeks ago. You were actually shocked. I thought then it was weird but decided to let it go. But it’s part of the weirdness. Something is off, and I’m your friend so I want to help.”

Harry looked around. They were still alone in the hallway for now, which was a rarity but welcomed. And it could change at any time. “Justin, okay. We can talk about this, but not here. Let’s just get to the kitchen, pick up what we want and get back to the dorms. We can see if our dorm room is empty, or if not maybe we can use one of the quiet rooms for a chat if we can find one that’s empty.” ‘But only the one without any portraits in it if it comes to that’ Harry added silently to himself.

Xoxoxoxoxoxox

‘Well that was mostly a bust’ thought Harry as he and Justin returned to the dorms with their bounty. ‘One of the elves looked at me a little longer than the others, but then looked at Justin with me and turned away. So I think I’m supposed to get a message from one of the elves, but they really meant that I need to be alone. But it could be that he was just looking longer for some other reason.’

They passed through the common room and crawled through the hole to get to their dorm room, pushing their bags ahead of them for a few minutes until the tunnel widened and rose to allow them to stand fully again. Moments later they were in their dorm room. And they were the only ones in the dorm room. Justin immediately turned to Harry. “Okay, so we’re alone for now. I’m not asking you to bare your soul or anything like that, but really, something is up with you and I wouldn’t be a very good friend if I didn’t ask about it.”

“Give me a minute Justin. It’s not all just my secrets.” Harry thought about what he could share. He couldn’t talk about the goblins, and if he said it wasn’t his aunt who taught him about eating right that was a clear sign that someone else was helping him. Which, okay, it shouldn’t matter if Justin knew that, but it was pretty obvious that Justin was the person he was closest to (though he was starting to let a few others in too) and if the Headmaster was going to go to anyone about him it would be Justin. And he couldn’t ask Justin not to talk to the Headmaster about it because that would just raise more questions.

Harry looked up at his friend. Justin had sat down on his bed and was looking at Harry with an open, encouraging expression.

“Okay, so I told you that my aunt didn’t like me much. All of them really, my aunt, uncle and my cousin. And my cousin is pretty much my age, about a month older, and attended the same school I did up until this year.” Harry paused, took a deep breath and let it out slowly before continuing as Gerald had taught him as an exercise to keep calm. “And my cousin pretty much took his attitude from my aunt and uncle as we grew up. He was never punished while I was always punished. Nothing was his fault; everything was my fault. As we grew older, he actively made my life hell at school. He was a bully, and while he picked on me most often he made sure that no one wanted to play or spend time with me because if they did they immediately became his new favorite target until they stopped. Not that he stopped picking on me while focused on whoever it was. I was pretty much always a target. It got to the point that the rare transfer kids were warned off the first few days of the year so they wouldn’t even try to be my friend.

So when you said it seems like I don’t know how to act or deal with other kids…you’re right. I don’t, not really. I’ve never been able to.” Harry didn’t think he could really talk about much more than that without going into areas that were dangerous, but that should be safe enough to talk about.

“What! The teachers just let your cousin get away with stuff like that?”

“Well, since my aunt and uncle didn’t like me much and always told everyone I was a troublemaker and came from bad blood, the teachers tended to believe Dudley when he told them I had started whatever problem or fight they were asking about. And my aunt and uncle would back him up if I tried to say something different. So Dudley would get away with pretty much anything when it came to me.” Harry sat down on his bed facing Justin. “I spent a lot of time by myself growing up. After so many tries to make friends only to have them get hurt or scared off…I got used to being alone. I still get uncomfortable if too many people are too close. I’m fine in class because that’s something I’m used to. And meals are enough like lunches in the school cafeteria that I’m fine with that too. But the study sessions…those were really weird at first. And having people ask my opinion and actually listen when I said something? Yeah. I can see I might look off sometimes. And I probably looked so shocked when Hermione hugged me because I don’t remember any ever doing that before.”

“Wow. That’s … I don’t even know what that is, but yeah,” came Justin’s response. “What about how freaked you looked … Harry?”

Harry had visibly flinched hard when Justin said freaked and sort of curled up in on himself. He was trying to get over some of his reactions, but talking about his aunt and uncle and Dudley had brought all of it back up. And a few months of positive feedback wasn’t really enough to totally erase 10 years of conditioning. The conditioning that said hearing the word freak or any variation thereof meant he was going to get hit very shortly. After another minute or two had passed Harry straightened back up and looked Justin in the eye again. “Sorry about that. It’s just that freak was the most common way my relatives talked about me, up to using it to call me instead of my name a lot of the time.” Most of the time really, unless in public and from Dudley sometimes even then. “So hearing that word while talking about my relatives… Well, sorry.”

“Hey, no need to apologize. All these things you’ve never talked about. And you totally don’t need to talk about it if it’s going to make you upset. I just wanted to understand. You’re my friend. But why did you look so spooked when I talked about Smith trying to get into your trunk?”

“Oh, it’s just that my trunk has everything in it. I never had much, and my cousin had a habit of taking back anything of mine that he wanted, so I didn’t want to leave anything I did have behind. What I do have I’m protective of, because it’s not much and I have bad history with it being taken from me. So hearing that he was trying to get into my trunk worried me.”

“Wow, and your aunt and uncle were just okay with that?”

“I told you they don’t like me much.”

“Well yeah, but not liking you much and letting your cousin steal your stuff are two different things.”

“I don’t think they thought of it as him stealing my stuff and more like just taking his old stuff back.”

There was a short pause while Justin clearly tried to make sense of that statement.

“Okay, I’m confused. What do you mean he was taking back…his old stuff? What about your stuff?” Justin said in a puzzled tone.

“Well, except for my glasses which Aunt Petunia got from a donation bin all the stuff I got was hand me downs from Dudley, so I never really had just my stuff until I got my school – and by school I mean Hogwarts – supplies. So if he wanted something back he just took it.”

“But you just said you were the same age, about. In the same classes.” Justin was very clearly puzzled what he was hearing.

“Yeah, like I said, he’s about a month older. But he’s always been bigger, so as he grew out of clothes I got them. And if he broke one of his toys and didn’t want it anymore, I was allowed to play with it. But only as long as he didn’t want it. So not stealing, taking back.”

“And school supplies?” Justin asked, his voice rising in patent disbelief at what he was hearing.

“Oh, I’d get used stuff, like worn down pencils and the like, or a notebook Dudley spilled ink on partway through so he didn’t want it anymore. He wasn’t big on school so once I had that stuff I was usually okay. Except for my homework. If Dudley hadn’t gotten around to his, he’d often take mine. And if a teacher said something about the handwriting, it was always my fault. And anything else that was supposedly mine was fair game.”

“That’s…I don’t even know what that is. But yeah, if you never really could call anything your own I can see why you’d jump at the thought of someone going through you stuff. But from how he was acting and talking, Smith didn’t actually get into your trunk, so whatever locks and charms you have on that thing are working. Which means it is the best place to store our booty until tomorrow to make sure it’s still around.” Justin stated in a firm tone, and then just looked at Harry expectantly.

Harry blinked at the abrupt topic change back to storing the food they had picked up.  “Right. That makes sense.” He waited a moment to see if Justin was going to leave or turn away but he just stood there watching Harry calmly. Harry thought a moment. They hadn’t gotten so much food that it wouldn’t fit in the normal compartment, but it would probably be better stored by itself in a corner of the large room Harry used for training. He certainly wasn’t going to mix it in where he kept his potions supplies or books! But did he want to share the secret of his trunk with Justin?

Harry turned to his trunk and used the key to open the ‘normal’ compartment. Opening the larger room like compartment would raise too many questions he couldn’t answer without risking too much. Maybe someday he’d be able to share more, but not right now. He shifted enough around in his trunk to make room and placed their goodies securely before reclosing and relocking his trunk.

“All set until tomorrow. And Justin, I appreciate you wanted to make sure I’m okay. It’s just still kinda new. I am your friend, and I am grateful you care enough to not just ignore it. It’s just really hard to talk about. But going back to our plans for tomorrow, do you think having snacks available will make Smith be less of a git during the study session?” asked Harry.

Justin burst out laughing. “Somehow I don’t think so. As long as you know I am your friend and I am here for you if you need something we can build on from there. And anytime you want to talk, whether you are sharing secrets or not, I’m available to listen.

“Thanks Justin.”

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxox

Two days later Harry decided he would try the kitchens again. It was still another week until the month ended, and Merlin only knew how long it would take for Professor Snape to decide he could make the time to go to the kitchens with Harry. Not to mention that house elves were decidedly different from wizards, and might be able to tell the Professor was there even if he couldn’t be seen. From what little Harry had been able to find in the library yesterday about the house elves they used a completely different approach to magic. They didn’t use wands, and they could do things no wizard could like moving in and out of Hogwarts regardless of the wards that stopped wizards from just appearing and disappearing. Apparating the book had called it. But whatever elves did wasn’t that. So even if the Professor was being all sneaky the elves still might not talk to him. If Harry was right and it was an elf that wanted to talk to him.

It was still pretty early, and on Sunday that meant that no other student was out and about in the corridors as Harry walked to the painting and tickled the pear to get into the kitchen. Once he was there he stepped over to the side, keeping out of the way of the bustling elves that were clearly preparing breakfast for the students. One of the elves left their work and started over to him, only to stop as soon as it got a good look at who he was. “Master Potter! Mipsy will get the Eldest!”

‘Well, that seems to make it pretty clear that it’s an elf that has this mysterious message for me,’ thought Harry as he waited.

In a very short time a different elf was making his way over to where Harry was standing waiting. As soon as it was close enough to be heard without yelling it said “Young Master Heir is welcome. He needs to be following me please.” It then turned around and started back to the other end of the kitchen. Harry shrugged, figuring he’d come this far already, and followed.

As Harry walked past the huge tables that mirrored the set up in the Great Hall above, the various elves he passed took a moment to look at him and each nodded their head briefly but slowly. It was weird. It was slower than a true nod, a lowering of the head with a pause before the head lifted again. It didn’t last long, so briefly, but it was more than just a simple nod, so slowly. Harry couldn’t figure it out.

Once past the tables the number of other elves lessened dramatically. Most of the cooking areas and prep areas were around the walls near the large tables. This seemed to be more of a storage area. There were still other elves, but they were more entering and leaving this section while carrying various things. The elf Harry was following was still moving though. Harry realized they seemed to be heading to another door at the far end of the room.

“Excuse me, where are we going?”

“Not there yet.”

“I didn’t ask if we were there yet, I asked where we were going. Perhaps a better question is if it is you I am meeting or if you are taking me to meet someone else.” Harry stopped walking as he spoke. He was curious enough and brave enough to risk going alone when he thought he’d be in a crowd of other beings, but at this point there were maybe only one or two other elves in sight, and who knew what was going to behind the door they were heading toward.

“Going to the meeting room.”

“And who am I meeting.”

“The Masters wanting to be speaking with the Heir”

Harry blinked. “Okay, I think I know what you are referring to, but to be sure, what am I supposedly heir of.”

“Not just heir, the Heir. And the Heir of Slytherin.”

Harry blinked. He thought that was what he would hear, but it was still something of a shock to actually have it said. “And who are these masters?”

“The Masters. The first Masters. Theys want to speak with the Heir to see if he is to be being the new Master.” By this point the elf realized Harry had stopped following and had turned back slightly.

‘First Masters?’ What the heck was he getting into? “And I can’t bring anyone else with me to this meeting?”

“Masters only meet with the Heirs. No others. Not allowed. Come along, not good to make Masters wait.”

“But it’s not like they know I’m coming, and I have more questions. Like who are the other Heirs?” Harry was torn between really wanting to do this himself and yet being cautious.

“Masters know what eldest knows. They are waiting, not good to make wait. Come now,” was the reply from the elf.

“Look, I’m not sure I’m comfortable meeting with an unknown person or persons by myself.”

“Not meeting persons. Meeting Masters.”

“Just because they are masters doesn’t mean they aren’t people,” Harry retorted.

“The Masters are used to be people. The Masters are paintings now.”

Harry blinked. “So there isn’t going to be anyone alive wherever you are taking me? What about the other Heirs you mentioned” If the elf was the only living being and these mysterious masters were paintings, how much danger could there be?

“Masters in restricted area. Only eldest can enter, and the Heirs. Youse is only Heir in castle right now. Only Masters waiting. Come now, Masters will answer any other questions!” The elf looked sternly enough at Harry as he said that last to give Professor McGonagall a run for her money.

From the admittedly limited reading Harry had done he didn’t think elves were supposed to be that demanding, but unlike Hermione Harry was willing to admit that not all information found in books was going to be correct. Harry started walking again.

Once through the door Harry had thought they were heading for, Harry found himself in small roundish room with several doors leading out. The elf was standing next to the door to the immediate left of where they had entered. The door had the Hogwarts crest in relief at about chest height. “Heir will place his hand on the crest now,” instructed the elf.

Harry shrugged and placed his hand over the large H in the center of the crest. Immediately the various totem animals came to life. Harry tried to pull away, but it felt like his hand was glued down. Each of the totems appeared to attack – biting at his hand where it was closest to their section of the crest. Harry felt sharp quick pains at each place he was bit, like being pricked with a large needle, and his whole body flushed with heat. The crest flared with light from within, and his hand was released.

Harry immediately brought his hand up to inspect the damage, only to be unable to find any evidence of the bites he had felt. ‘Magic is so weird sometimes’.

The elf meanwhile had opened the door and was motioning Harry inside. Harry figured he’d come this far, and stepped through the door.


	17. Meeting the Masters

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yes, they are who you are almost certainly thinking they are.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So moving right along now. The next chapter is already written, but I am going to continue to wait to post chapters until I have at least two chapters finished because there have been too many times that I wanted to go back and change something and that is usually in the most recent chapter posted. With that said, I have already started chapter 19 so hopefully it won't be too long.

Harry found himself in a medium sized room that was shaped a little oddly; it was significantly wider at the far end than at the end he entered, with the side walls angled outward accordingly. This shape meant that the series of paintings along the three walls not containing the door all had some sort of line of sight to the far wall, no matter where they were hung. The paintings varied in subject with some portraits, several landscapes, and several paintings that looked like just empty rooms. Harry saw a library pictured, as well as a potions lab, an armory, and a room with strange things Harry didn’t recognize. The landscapes included a beach, a forest, and what looked like Hogwarts castle among others. All the portraits he could see were looking towards him, even the ones that were clearly moving from frame to frame. The largest frame, nearly the entire height and length of the wall it was hung on, was centered directly across from the door. This frame appeared to be the goal of the three figures moving from frame to frame on the two side walls, and there were two painted figures already in the frame, sitting at the large table that was the focus of the image.

The table in the middle of the painting was set up with half a dozen chairs along the far side of the table, facing out into the room, and the table ran right up to the edge. The perspective and size was such that it appeared less to be a painting and more to be an archway into another part of the same room, with a table set right at the break. This illusion was assisted by the fact that due to the size of the painting, once the figures entered the portrait they presented as nearly life-size. There were a few additional figures beyond the ones already in the large painting or moving to it that were staying in various of the other paintings on the side walls (while looking at Harry as previously mentioned), but those other figures were simply sitting or standing quietly observing without making any indication they were going to be actively involved in whatever this was going to be.

“Er, hello.” Harry said. Internally he winced as soon as he spoke. Gerald would set him to lines if he ever knew how fast all those etiquette lessons Gerald had drummed into his head could be forgotten. He took a deep breath and started again. “Good morning,” he said with a bow, bending to the angle he had been taught was appropriate for courtesy when unaware of the social standing of the one or ones you were addressing. “I was told that my presence was requested. I have arrived without accompaniment, as the message indicated.” As he continued to speak he finished his bow, coming to stand straight in the stance Gerald had called ‘parade rest’. He saw there was a chair and table set further in the room, both centered in front of the large focal painting and clearly meant for someone interacting with those within the large painting to use, but until he was formally invited to sit he was going to err on the side of caution. So he kept his shoulders back and his posture straight, with his hands clasped behind his back and his feet set parallel but slightly apart to assist in balance.

“How polite! Isn’t he such a polite young man, Sal?” one of the two ladies already sitting at the imaged table said.

“Yes, yes, he is very polite,” said the first of the male figures entering the painting.  “That doesn’t mean anything. Dumbledore is usually polite. Doesn’t mean he isn’t an utter wan-“

“SAL! Language!” Interrupted the woman who had first spoken, who was sitting at the end of the table opposite from where the men were entering the frame.

“Composed too, that young man,” observed one of the other men as he took a seat at the table next to the center chair. “He isn’t babbling a dozen questions like the last one we saw.”

“Again, doesn’t mean a thing.”

“Not necessarily, no, but it certainly isn’t a negative,” said the last male to enter the frame. “You are always so negative these days.”

“Well, when the bulk of the people go around cursing your name, and some self-important jumped up descendant of a bastard line decides to twist your legacy so badly that everyone associated with you is tarred with the same brush and viewed with suspicion and loathing just for existing, let’s see how sunny and happy you can be. When that happens and you turn all cynical and depressing, I’ll be over here saying I told you so. In the meantime, yes, I’m going to be negative and surly and unpleasant.” The man addressed as Sal, that Harry was pretty sure was a painting of Salazar Slytherin himself, grimaced as he took the center seat most directly facing the single physical chair in the room.

Once he was settled he looked out directly at Harry. “Well, don’t just stand there child, come and sit down so we can talk. The door verified you are descended of my direct line as we were told, so you are welcome in the Legacy room.”

“Of course it also identified him as a descendant of one of my cadet branches, which is interesting and must come through his mother as the Potters are one of the few that have never married into my line,” commented the woman sitting next to him at the at the table. “I abhor this practice of dumping squibs into the non-magical community. Sooner or later the magic manifests again and the poor dears have no idea of their heritage or-“

“Enough, Helga, we are all aware of and agree with your feelings on squibs and the so-called muggleborn. And while you may find it interesting that he can trace his line back to you as well it is certainly not uncommon as your entire family has a history of being exceedingly fecund, and with him being a British born magical honestly it would be more startling if he could NOT trace his lineage back to you in some way. But that is not enough to gain him entry into this room with the current ward settings. Acknowledged magical heirs only meeting all set requirements, which for him is my line, so while I am sure you will be discussing his genealogy with him at some point it will not be right now,” retorted the man before turning to Harry again. “Please, come and sit down.”

At this repeated welcome, Harry finally moved the last few steps to the waiting chair and table. He sat down and looked at the five figures – three men and two women – who were all now seated facing him.

“As you may have figured out, I am Salazar Slytherin, and as I know you are aware, I am your direct ancestor through your father’s family. To my right is Helga Hufflepuff, who is apparently also your direct ancestor presumably through your mother’s family, with Rowena Ravenclaw on her other side. To my left is Godric Gryffindor, with Myrddin Emrys on his other side.”

Harry was glad he was sitting down. He had started to suspect he was going to be meeting the founders when the elf was talking about Masters and said he was meeting ‘used to be people’ in paintings, but Myrddin Emrys! That was Merlin! He had not expected to meet Merlin.

Meanwhile, Salazar was continuing to speak. “We invited you here to meet us to formally recognize you as my Heir, and discuss with you some of the things we have been hearing about the current Headmaster. I in particular want to talk about the fact that multiple sources are reporting that the current Headmaster is trying to get you killed, and determine what if anything you know about it.”

Harry blinked. He was glad he had already had his panic attack over the news Dumbledore was trying to kill him, as otherwise he would be falling apart now. “I am aware that the Headmaster is attempting to get me killed. My information indicates he would like me to do something reckless and die in an accident rather than kill me directly.” Harry paused and thought a moment. “I have been told, but have no way of getting independent confirmation, that he has done this before. I do not have any specifics though.”

“Good. I was not sure if you were aware of the seriousness of his interest in you. Tristan reported one of the former Headmasters had met with you, but he was not present to know exactly what was said.”

“You know Tristan?”

“Tristan is my youngest grandchild,” said Godric. “Since he is the son of one of my daughters, he does not share my surname. He was a teacher here as an adult, and agreed to have one of his paintings in the public areas of the castle as our point of contact with the inhabitants and rest of the outside world. History has forgotten our connection over time.”

“Why would you need that point of contact, for that matter why aren’t your paintings in a more public area. The Great Hall, or even the headmaster’s office?  Why can’t you just go and visit other paintings? I’ve seen that several times since coming here.” Harry had been wondering about that since he realized who he was going to be meeting.

“The four of us,” Godric motioned to Salazar and the ladies to indicate he was not including Merlin in this group, “decided when we commissioned our portraits that we needed to step back from the day to day running of the school. We knew if we left our master paintings in an accessible area we would be constantly asked for advice and input, and wanted to let the subsequent headmasters stand on their own. So we created this room as a place we could exist in comfort with select friends and heirs invited to join us, invited both at the time of the room’s creation and now and again throughout the years. We made this decision after seeing what Merlin went through before we even founded the school. We made our decision due to how popular Hogwarts became, and how famous we became as the founders.  Merlin was the first person we invited to join us, and the only one that was already in portrait.”

Rowena picked up the explanation. “We technically can travel outside of this room by going to one of our static portrait copies and from there to other paintings, but almost all of our static portraits are in very public areas. The few that aren’t are either in private collections or locked in vaults, all of which have ward restrictions on moving in and out to prevent spying and theft. The way we set it up, to keep this room a sanctuary, any inhabitant whose master portrait is in this room can only travel in and out from her to one of their own paintings. And no one who does not have a master painting hung in this room is capable of accessing any of the paintings in this room. So Tristan has his master painting here, with a fake master painting in his old classroom, and he can move between the two of them. Once at his fake master painting, he can move around to any other painting in the public areas of the castle. Tristan while he lived also hung some of the later portraits that we decided to invite to join us once we had the system up and running.”

Salazar took over speaking at that point. “Getting back to the point, I knew I had an Heir meeting my set requirements because when you signed the parchmentwork reaffirming my line’s treaty with the goblins it caused a change in the castle’s magic. You were the first of my descendants in a long time to reinstate the treaty, and since at its core it is a mutual defense pact, the castle’s ward schema was updated automatically to recognize any force sent by the goblin chief as allowed defenders. That let me know one of my direct-”

“Does Dumbledore know? Would he know the treaty is active again?” was Harry’s immediate, urgent question, even to the point of violating his etiquette lessons and interrupting Salazar, who gave Harry a quelling look, but paused his speaking.

“As headmaster he has a connection to the wards. He can raise or lower different parts of the ward system to be more or less restrictive on who is allowed in the castle what means of access are permissible. He never went through the ritual to fully connect to the ward heartstone though, so I doubt he is sensitive enough to feel the wards update. He certainly would not have understood what it was even if he did recognize the schema updated.” This was said by Godric again. “While as paintings we cannot be connected to the wards directly any longer, the Hogwarts elves are oath bound to the castle itself and not to any individual. So they are also tied into the wards, and informed us of the change.”

Harry relaxed back into the chair again. The goblins wanted to keep Dumbledore ignorant of the treaty reinstatement until Harry’s 15th birthday if possible, when Harry would be able to fully take on the Lordship and all the rights and responsibilities that went along with it. He would have a seat on the Wizengamot, and be entitled to propose and vote on laws. Which meant that he could try to reverse some of the severe restrictions imposed on the goblins since the treaty had gone dormant, restrictions that had led to the series of goblin rebellions that took place a few hundred years ago.

“Okay, so you knew you had an heir in the castle, and I guess I was recognized when I first visited the kitchens a few weeks ago?” Harry looked at the founders and received several nods in reply.

“Yes, the elves recognized your connection to the castle wards the first time they saw you in person and realized you must be the Heir. The head elf has standing instructions to bring any Heirs to us whenever they are found, so the message was sent asking you to visit the kitchens on your own.” Helga volunteered this piece of information.

“That’s the bit I don’t get. If the elves have orders to bring your heirs to you, why all the run around. Why not just have one of the elves come up to me and tell me the founder’s portraits wanted to speak to me?”

“Honestly, child. Think for a moment.” Back to Salazar. “We spent a great deal of time and effort hiding the existence of our master portraits. Since the various copies around the world are not interactive, it is assumed the master paintings were lost or destroyed. If an elf just approached you anywhere with the message we wanted to meet you, the likelihood of the news of our existence would be all over the castle if not the entire British magical society faster than a snitch flies.”

“I could have been approached when I was alone.”

“And the odds are that you would have told at least someone before coming here. This is safer.”

“So how is this different? How is it safer?” Harry didn’t get it.

Merlin entered the conversation at this point. “First, the guardian seal that sampled your blood and validated your heritage ensures that only a select few are allowed in the room. No one can come in with you, even if your blood opens the door. The wards on the room will not permit it. You were not told who you were meeting until you were inside and the door closed again. And once you are in the room, you cannot speak of anything you learn in the room unless given very specific permission by all five of us. It was originally going to be permission by just these four,” Merlin looked sideways down the table with a grin, “but when they were setting the whole thing up and offered to move my master painting here to share their sanctuary I insisted on having input on who was granted permission to pass on the information as well.” The founders reacted to this statement with grins of their own, though Salazar’s was small, short, and accompanied by an eye roll.

Harry nearly laughed. He’d not expected the founders to be so human. Everyone spoke of them as larger than life icons. Considering the treatment he got sometimes, he could understand why they felt the need for a sanctuary. He was tired of it after only a few months. He couldn’t imagine expecting several centuries of it. But while it was nice to find the founders were human and so easy to talk to, he was still had a major concern with what he was being told.

“So you can share information with me, but I can’t share it with anyone else. That’s…not really helpful.” Harry knew he was being a little rude, but all this sneaking around and keeping track of who knew what and what each person was allowed to know was getting hard to keep straight in his head.  He was very tired of it.

Salazar laughed. “Be at ease my Heir. We will grant you permission to discuss the information you need to share. We just won’t give you permission to explain how you got it or allow you share our existence with anyone else.”

“Okay. I just have one question. Well, actually I have a ton of questions, but I have one question that has nothing at all to do with current events but it’s going to drive me nuts until I find out the answer,” Harry said.

“And what is that,” replied Salazar.

“Merlin. He was supposed to have attended Hogwarts and been in your house, but you said he was already a painting when you did this. That you saw what he went through before the school was founded, so how could he have attended Hogwarts?”

“How familiar are you with my legend, and in particular with my abilities?” asked Merlin.

“Uh, you were really powerful, you were an advisor and wizard to King Arthur. Uh, you attended Hogwarts, like I said…can’t really think of anything else.”

“Well one of parts of my legend that has been misunderstood is the part where I supposedly could project myself forward in time. That is incorrect. However, I was in a magical accident in my seventh year at Hogwarts and was thrown back in time several centuries, where I lived the rest of my time as a mortal. That is when I mentored the boy who became King Arthur and made my reputation. Essentially, when I found myself suddenly centuries before I was born with a significant amount of foreknowledge, and the awareness of what abilities the famous Myrddin was supposed to have… Well, I had always thought my family name meant I was related to the old wizard in some way and that I was named in his honor.  But actually, while I was named after who I thought I was, namely who I thought was my more famous relative, it turns out I was actually descended from a child I adopted in the past and the reason I was named Myrddin was due to instructions I left for my own parents in the family vault. It’s enough to make your head hurt really,” he added in a thoughtful tone.

“At any rate, the founders were familiar with my portrait, and how the various government leaders were always hounding me for knowledge and advice. So when they were setting this up they finagled some time alone with my master portrait, explained the plan and asked if I wanted to be a part of it. It took some doing to get my master portrait copied and replaced, but they managed it and I’ve been here ever since. It’s why what is thought to be my master portrait so rarely interacts with anyone and hasn’t for centuries. I spend nearly all my time here.”

“Wow. That’s … I don’t know what to say to that. But it’s an honor to meet you.” Harry’s eyes were wide as he absorbed that it was possible to get thrown back in time for centuries. Magic just got weirder and weirder the more he learned about it.

After giving Harry a moment to absorb the information. Salazar started speaking again. “So you know to be wary of the Headmaster. The house elves have been alerted and at least one will be keeping an eye on you at all times. The headmaster will also be watched.”

“How can that work? From what I read house elves have to obey their bonded master. As the school Headmaster, doesn’t that mean they have to obey him?” asked Harry.

“Remember, the elves bonded to the school, not to any one person. This was to prevent any one family from gaining control of the school. It was meant to be open to all. They will listen to the headmaster of course, as they would any teacher, as he and they are authority figures in the school. But of anyone living here, they will obey you above all as you are the only Heir currently in the castle.”

“So there are other heirs then?”

“Yes and no. Each of us set certain requirements on our lines that have to be fulfilled for someone to be acknowledged as the Heir, as opposed to just an heir of the line. For my line, that included signing the treaty with the Goblins. You are the first Potter to do that; the last of my descendants to sign the treaty was Ignotus Peverell some 500 years ago. So while I have other descendants, including unfortunately that arrogant tosser Tom Riddle who murdered your parents, you are my first true Heir since then.

The other founders,” and Salazar motioned to either side of himself as he said this, “also set certain conditions. At this moment in time, you are the only acknowledged Heir for any of us, and while there could be others who have the possibility of being a named Heir, in practice it is a fairly rare occurrence. For example, take Rowena. She is the only founder with no direct descendants living. Technically a descendant of one of her siblings could qualify and be named her Heir but the other requirements beyond familial relationship that she set are all but impossible to fulfill.”

“That’s because I have **standards** , unlike some wicca,” said Rowena with a sniff and a toss of her head.

Harry just stared as the founders lapsed into what was clearly a well-worn argument with entrenched positions. Merlin looked at Harry and winked. He mouthed something at Harry without actually speaking, but Harry just shook his head. He had no idea what Merlin was trying to tell him and he was not getting in the middle of what was gearing up into full scale battle between the founders.

“ENOUGH!” As he shouted, Merlin did something that made it appear that starbursts of light were exploding above the table. Blinking rapidly, Harry belatedly realized that Merlin had been trying to tell him to close his eyes. “I have long learned to tune the four of you out when you revisit this topic but young Harry does not need to listen to this squabble. He most certainly has other things to do today and there is only so long he can stay here without questions being raised. We need to make sure we give him the rest of the information he needs today, and discuss when he will next return.”

The founders all sat back in their chairs looking rather sheepish.

“Yes, well, you make a good point.” Salazar looked down for a moment and took a deep breath. “So, you are already aware that the current Headmaster means you ill. You are now aware that you are connected to the castle wards; there is a small volume of information on what your connection allows. You will need to either find time to read it here or copy the book as the original is not permitted to be taken out of this room. This is important to you as you can set up notifications on certain events or individuals that will give you warning should something like the troll a few weeks ago recur.

Speaking of which, the wards have been altered to allow such creatures access to the castle, and the one brought in a few weeks ago is actually the second one brought into the castle this year. The other is somewhere in that death trap of a maze created off the third floor corridor the Headmaster warned students about in the opening feast. There have been other alterations to the wards over the years that have weakened them, never more so since this current Headmaster has taken over. He has lowered an unprecedented number of protections, and left them lowered for extraordinary lengths of time for no justifiable reason we can determine. The elves are connected to the wards and can tell the changes, but do not have the authority to make changes on their own. As my acknowledged Heir, you have authority over the wards above the Headmaster and can raise the protections back up if you so choose.

While doing so is certainly recommended from a safety standpoint, if you do the headmaster will recognize the changes have occurred as they will have negative impact on his activities and interfere with his plans.” Salazar stopped at that point to allow Harry to absorb the information he had been given.

After a short time as Harry just sat thinking about what he had been told, Salazar resumed speaking. “As previously mentioned, there is another of my descendants running around causing issues. Tom Riddle. This so called Lord Voldemort.”

“What? But he’s dead, right? That’s why I’m so famous. I killed him when I was just a baby.” Harry was very confused now.

“He is not dead, he was only disembodied. He has delved into the blackest of magics and is a stain upon my house. He has perverted family honor and-“

“Salazar, focus!” Helga spoke sharply, interrupting what was clearly shaping up to be an epic rant. She turned to Harry as Salazar shook himself and started taking deep breaths again. “The main issue dear, is that this self-styled Lord Voldemort is currently possessing one of the Professors in the castle. The ward that would have prevented his entry onto castle grounds at all while possessed is one of the ones most recently deactivated by the Headmaster but there are other reporting measures for possessions in place that are not dependent on the ward being active. Unfortunately-,”

As she continued to speak Harry fell out of the chair he was sitting in and completely lost it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, Harry has reached his breaking point


	18. Why Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry feels rather sorry for himself, but deals.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this is later than I planned. I got an idea in my head that would not let go and in impacted being able to work on this (see new short one shot just posted). But once I wrote that out I was able to go back to this again. 
> 
> For those coming back after a month, remember at the end of the last chapter Harry lost it after being told Voldemort was not actually dead, and was possessing one of his teachers.

“Why? Why does all the crazy stuff happen to me? Why did I have to be the one to manage to kill, sorry disembody, this Lord Voldie whatever when no one else could? Why does the Headmaster want me dead? Why am I the one that is supposed to fix all this stuff? I’m eleven! I should not have to worry about being killed in arranged accidents or whatever. Why am I the only one? Why!?!” Harry all but wailed that last. This was too much. He had been dealing with the Headmaster wanting him dead, mostly by not thinking about it much. He had been dealing with the knowledge that his godfather was in prison, even though there were questions as to if he was really guilty or not, again by mostly not thinking about it much. And he had been dealing with all the extra lessons Gerald was putting him through because the goblins told him it was needed for his position, even though he felt that he was always behind and would never catch up. And because he was truly interested in learning about most of it, even if he thought most of the formal etiquette he was being taught was awfully outdated and unnecessary.

But this was too much. He had hit the limit of what he was prepared to accept. As he ranted, he was rapidly scrambling backwards toward the door, half crawling and half stumbling as he struggled to get himself back fully upright from falling on the floor.

“I’ve had it. I can just go find somewhere else. Anywhere else. This can’t be the only school to learn magic from.”

Harry reached the back of the room, it really wasn’t that large, got himself standing on his feet again and turned to open the door. The door that wasn’t there any longer. For the second time since coming to Hogwarts, Harry had been cut off from any means of escape. “NO! Not fair! Let me out! I’m done!” Harry started pounding on the wall where the door should have been. All the wicca in the side portraits were shouting at him in a din such that he couldn’t make out any individual voices or words.

There was another very bright flash of light; very similar to what Merlin had done to stop the founder’s bickering earlier. This one came from the side wall, and once Harry had blinked the afterimages from his eyes and turned to face the source, he saw that Merlin had relocated to the portrait nearest to where he was standing. The flash had also had the effect of quieting down all the other figures in the various frames around the room.

Once all the portraits had stilled, Merlin spoke to Harry directly. “Young man, I can sympathize to some extent. When I found myself thrown into my own past and realized that I had to become a legend, and that I was going to be responsible for shaping the fate of the nation with no one I could talk to about it… It’s a heavy thing to have such responsibilities. And in many ways you are in a worse place than I was.  Everyone has expectations of you, whereas I was the only one with expectations of me. High expectations granted, with the knowledge I could destroy everything I had known growing up if I failed, but I was the only one who had that knowledge and who had those expectations. And I had a broad outline of what course to follow based on the history I knew from my life in the future. I was older than you, had substantially more magical education than you, and was able to make my own way in the new world I found myself in. I also did not have anyone trying to kill me, at least not right away.

You have the expectation of your peers as well as adults who should know better to be better than you think you can be based on something that happened that you cannot remember. You have immense pressure from the goblins to be their advocate in your future. You already had one figure of power in your life that you know wants you to die and is willing to try to arrange events to help make that happen. And now you are being told there is a second, exceedingly powerful wizard that wants you dead. And this one is probably going to be more proactive at it. To have that additional stress piled on top of what you were already dealing with; frankly it is a wonder you lasted as long as you did.

But know that while you are under a tremendous amount of pressure you have one very large advantage that I lacked. You are not alone. You were not asked here to simply add to your burdens but to give you additional knowledge you needed and to give you support to help you meet those burdens. We are trying to help you and make your life easier, though I can understand that it might not seem that way to you right now.” With that last, Merlin fell silent, and waited for Harry to respond.

Harry leaned back against the wall (that should be a door, dammit!), stared up at the ceiling, and gulped air into his lungs. He thought about what Merlin had said. Was it better to stay ignorant of yet another threat? Merlin said this other guy wants him dead too. He could have been so busy watching for the headmaster he might have missed this other professor.

“Which one is possessed? Who else wants me dead?” he finally got out.

“The Defense against Dark Arts professor, Quirrell.”

“Quirrell?” Harry thought about that for a moment, while Merlin kept the others from speaking. While Quirrell seemed so harmless normally and stuttered his way through every class, there had been that flash of hatred Harry remembered seeing on his face on Halloween. “Wait, did Professor Quirrell bring the troll in on Halloween?”

“Yes, that is what seems to be the case. We are not sure why he let the troll in the school, but the likelihood of the troll just wandering in on its own is so remote…”

“Right. Simplest answer is usually the right answer and Quirrell was both the first person to see the troll and one of the few people not in the Great Hall when it supposedly got in. At least he doesn’t really demonstrate curses in class. That could lead to an unfortunate accident. Though it would be a little hard to cover up if he wants to keep his guest a secret.”

Merlin spoke up again. “Will you come back and sit down, we should not have you stay much longer but there is a little more we should go over. Nothing like the information about the self-styled dark lord. Just the information on how to connect to the wards and helping you through the process – learning how to alter them can wait a short while but you should be connected as soon as possible - and Rowena wants to explain to you how to gain access to the special room she created so you can use it to help your training and development. It is quite a remarkable place really. And you can use it to learn more about just about anything, or just give yourself a safe place to relax.”

Harry lowered his head and looked at Merlin. He straightened himself up and shook himself out. “I can do this.”

“Indeed, you are my Heir. Of course you can do this,” said Salazar proudly.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

A little while later Harry started making his way back to the Hufflepuff dorms. He had done the short ritual to connect to the wards using the focus the Founders had had installed in their Legacy room as they called it. He could now feel various issues around the castle like an itch in the back of his head. Godric told him that if the wards were fully raised the notifications that would be going off because of everything that had been brought in over the years would be overwhelming. Certainly if the Headmaster wanted all the crap that was apparently currently in the castle it explained why he not only lowered the actual wards to prevent it from entering but also apparently turned down or off most of the notifications as well. It didn’t make it right, but it did explain it.

Then as Harry was just one turning from the room containing the barrel entrance to the Hufflepuff dorms, from out of what Harry thought was a solid wall an arm darted out, grabbed Harry by the back of his neck and dragged him through the not so solid wall into a small empty room where he was shaken like a rag doll.

“Foolish, stupid child! You were told to wait until I could review the situation, and it was too soon after the visit to meet with Headmaster Black to risk going to another meeting with you.”

Harry still couldn’t see who had grabbed him, but Professor Snape’s voice was unmistakable. “But you didn’t even know…”

“Obviously I did. After our first meeting I thought it might behoove me to investigate alternate methods of communication that would be secure from tracking or interception, as well as being faster than waiting for scheduled owl deliveries. Once we met with Headmaster Black and he shared the portraits’ concerns it became more vital. I cannot communicate directly with Gerald as there would be no way to hide putting up a new magical portrait from the headmaster and I do not currently have any frames in my quarters, but the goblins are clever and set up a system where I can securely receive messages far faster than what was originally devised. I choose to wait and see what you did with this request, and barely a week and you are rushing in headstrong, just like your father you idiot child!” That last was accompanied by another vigorous shaking.

Harry tried to break free, but failed. He spat out his reply, “I don’t remember my dad, and I wasn’t rushing in. I tested it with someone else first, but nothing happened and I didn’t get the message. So I went back alone today, but I was careful!”

“You told someone else you had a request to meet with an unknown person or persons? That is-“

“No, that’s not what I meant. I meant I went to the kitchens with someone else for something else without telling him I was hoping to get a message. But nothing happened so I figured whoever the message was from was set on me being by myself when I arrived in the kitchen. I didn’t tell Jus…my friend anything. He just thought we were there to pick up some extra snacks.”

“Your friend Finch-Finchley. He doesn’t count. He is merely another first year and if someone was prepared to overcome you or cause you harm, the addition of just one more eleven year old would hardly have been a deterrent,” said Professor Snape in a sharp, biting tone. As he spoke, the professor finally released Harry’s neck with a tug on his shoulder that spun Harry around until they were facing each other. Professor Snape drew himself up to his full height as he did so and crossed his arms over his chest, glaring down in disapproval. “That is NOT being careful. That is being headstrong and foolish. I don't understand what you were thinking. If you were even thinking at all, in fact.”

Harry looked down and shuffled his feet. He had thought he was going to get hit when he was being spun around; that’s what would have happened if Vernon was the one shaking him like that. But the Professor wasn’t whaling on him. He was waiting for Harry to respond again. Harry's anger at being grabbed deflated. Vernon had never cared what Harry thought, and had never given him any chance to explain anything. Harry had thought that he had made a good choice; he learned lots of information and gained some more allies. But he had really liked it when Professor Snape had been proud of him after Halloween, and now that the Professor was upset with him Harry felt worse than he ever had with the Dursleys. He had never received (or expected really) anything positive from his relatives. He had never been praised for doing anything before Snape sent him that note, and now it was all turning around.

“…’m sorry,” he said in a small voice. “I just didn’t think it would be dangerous. Not like going somewhere abandoned. There are always house elves in the kitchen and I figured if something looked off I’d just turn around and leave.”

“But you didn’t turn around and leave; I’ve been waiting for you to return for nearly an hour now.” Professor Snape huffed in annoyance.  “Was it worth it at least? Who did you meet?”

Harry cringed a little, knowing the likely reaction to what he had to say. “I can’t tell you.”

“You most certainly will be telling me,” started Professor Snape.

“No, it’s not like that. I really can’t tell you. I can tell you some stuff, but not who I met. The magic … I didn’t really understand it. But there were wards on the place we met that mean I can’t tell you anything I don’t have permission to tell you. And I don’t have permission to tell you who I met with.”

Professor’s Snape reached out and firmly grabbed Harry’s chin, tilting his head up until their eyes met. Harry immediately had that rushing flood of memories like the last time the Professor had gotten into his head, but this was different, not jumping around so much. He felt like he was rapidly reliving the past hour or so of his life. He could see the house elf guide him back through the kitchen, and he relived the door biting his hand, but then everything went blurry with the sounds mixing into a roar that nothing could be made out in. The visible flow of memory picked back up with the door closing behind him and the elf guiding him back out of the kitchen. The whole thing had only taken a minute or two, far less time than Harry thought it would have. The professor's hand on his jaw loosened. 

Harry jerked back. “You said you wouldn’t do that again!”

“That was then. I had no further need to use legitimacy on you again at that point as I had learned everything I needed to. Now I have need of information you won’t tell me so I went looking for it. But whoever created the ward you spoke of was extraordinarily skilled. You clearly have the memory, and I would think that you can remember it if you are alone in your head without a problem. You might even have been aware of what the memory held while I was trying to see it. But I cannot view the events that took place in that room. I can’t see your thoughts about what took place in the room. That knowledge is completely blocked from the mind arts. Extraordinary.” Snape’s tone got a little softer as he spoke, and his attention was clearly now focused on thinking about what he had just seen, or more precisely, what he had just not seen and how it had been accomplished.

Harry stood there waiting for a few moments, and decided he was going to work even harder on his meditation exercises so he could develop the mental shields the Professor had talked about a while back. When Snape didn’t ask any further questions, he started to shuffle toward the darkened area of the wall that he had come through. That woke the professor up from whatever mental trance he had fallen into quickly enough, and Professor Snape grabbed Harry’s arm before he could escape.

“So you cannot tell me who you met with, but you said you could tell me … I think you phrased it as ‘some stuff’. So what can you tell me?”

“Um, what did the goblins tell you about me?”

“Why does it matter?” came the immediate rejoinder.

“Well, some of the stuff I can share might seem odd if you don’t know some of the stuff the goblins know.”

Snape’s eyebrow rose at that statement. “Why don’t you just start telling me what you are allowed to share, and if I need background information I will stop you and ask further questions,” he said in a dry tone.

“Um, okay. I guess the most important thing … There was a lot. But I think the most important thing is that that guy I was supposed to have killed when I was a baby isn’t really dead.” Harry stopped for a moment.

“That is not actually new information to me.” Snape stated while Harry was paused.

Harry blinked in surprise. “Oh, okay. Well did you know he’s possessing Professor Quirrell?” asked Harry.

Snape stared at Harry and said in an utterly emotionless tone “Professor Quirrell is being possessed by the spirit of the Dark Lord.”

“Um, yes?”

“You are certain of this?”

“Well, I trust the people who told me, and they also said he deliberately brought the troll into the castle on Halloween, which was allowed because the headmaster messed a lot with the wards over the years and lowered even more of the protections when he was setting up the … how did … right. He lowered more of the defensive wards when he was setting up ‘the death trap of a maze created off the third floor corridor’. You know the one, it’s what you were talking to Headmaster Black about. And is anything going to come of that? It’s been a few weeks since you brought it up.”

Professor Snape narrowed his gaze at Harry. “We are not discussing that right now. We are discussing what information you learned when you choose to be incredibly foolish and run off to meet with an unknown person or persons with no back up and without letting anyone know you were doing it.

So you have learned the Dark Lord is possessing Quirrell. You learned Headmaster Dumbledore has adjusted the ward settings lower which allows a variety of dangerous creatures in the castle. Anything else?”

“I learned how I can connect with the wards so I get the notifications the Headmaster is ignoring, like the one that tells him someone is possessed. I learned about a magic room up on the seventh floor where I can go to train more. I learned-“

“A magic room on the seventh floor? Could you be any more vague? What about this room makes it magic as opposed to the rest of the rooms in this castle?” Professor Snape interrupted.

“Um, you have to know what you want, and then you walk past it three times and it will give it to you.”

“It will give you want you want if you walk past three times.” Snape repeated flatly. “That makes exactly zero sense. This is clearly going to take longer than we have time for currently as it is getting later and people will start to notice your absence if you stay away much longer. Before the end of the day you will write down exactly what you learned, completely and exactly, and you will also as part of that give me precise instructions on how to access this magic room. These instructions will include where this room is found, what ‘know you what you want’ actually means, and how walking past the door three times causes this room to give it to you. You will NOT attempt to access this room until I have had a chance to do so first to ensure it is not some convoluted method of having you creatively appear to commit suicide. You will bring the essay and place it on the floor here no later than immediately after you finish your dinner tonight. If I come here after I finish dinner, and I will not leave the Great Hall until after you do this evening in case you were with friends on the way to dinner and not able to drop it off unobtrusively, but if I come here after my dinner, and there is not a complete and thorough report waiting for me I will be exceedingly displeased and you will have detention every Saturday for the next month. You may go now.”

And with that, the Professor left through a different section of wall from the one that Harry had been pulled through.

‘Great,’ thought Harry. ‘Now I’m getting non-school related homework from two directions instead of just Gerald. Seriously, why me?’

 


	19. The Room Of Requirement

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry shows Professor Snape the Room of Requirement, and they learn some disturbing information.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So last chapter Harry had a minor breakdown at the news Voldemort was in the castle, and after recovering, was waylaid by Professor Snape. After being essentially interrogated, Harry was given 'homework' regarding the information Harry had learned when he visited with the Founder's portraits (though the spell work held, and Professor Snape was unable to determine who/what Harry had actually met with).
> 
> And since I haven't done this in a while - I in no way, shape, or form, own Harry Potter, though I appreciate that JK lets us play in her sandbox. 
> 
> I do own my ideas, however, or which this story is one.

Harry made his way back to the dorm where he arrived to be just in time to meet up with a few of his female year mates and head to breakfast. Harry was still not used to other people in general, and girls were particularly strange, but hanging around Hermione had at least gotten him used to the idea that it was possible to be friends with a girl. So since all of the first year Hufflepuff boys were still sleeping while Susan Bones, Hannah Abbott, and Megan Jones were heading up to the Great Hall, Harry asked politely if he could join them.

“Sure Harry, we are all Puffs,” replied Hannah with a smile. “How did you do on that last Charms essay for Professor Flitwick?”

“I got an exceeds expectations, which I was really happy about. I’m so glad we were shown how to look up information using that catalog. I doubt I would have gotten even an acceptable if I had just used our course book for information, and I wouldn’t have found nearly as much extra stuff without a way to search for specifics. The information was scattered in so many different places in the library. I really don’t understand the filing system, but at least with the catalog it will find the book titles containing the information you need, and then tell you where to find them.”

“Oh, I know! It does make looking up information so much easier. They should do that every year, and earlier in the year at that. It beats just walking through the library scanning shelves looking for likely titles hands down,” chimed in Susan.

“Definitely,” came from Megan, with Hannah simply nodding to show her agreement.

“How did you do,” Harry asked in return.

“I got an exceeds too. I don’t think anyone in our year got an Outstanding, but I’m pretty sure all the first year Puffs got at least an acceptable.”

“That’s good. I know I wasn’t much into the study groups at first, but my prior school didn’t have anything like that and I just wasn’t sure about it. But it’s really making it easier, and I’m glad to be a part of Hufflepuff. My friend Hermione complains all the time about her year-mates lack of study skills and habits.”

“Well, this is nothing against your friend really, but she’s kinda a swot, you know.” Hannah said softly.

“I know. But she’s a great person when you get to know her.  And she feels really left out in Gryffindor. I don’t know why she didn’t sort to Ravenclaw; it seems like that would be a much better fit for her.”

“It’s not always clear why the hat sorts as it does, but my Aunt says there’s always a reason,” offered up Susan.

“Yeah, I mean, there has to be something under the obvious for some kids, otherwise how would Smith have ended up in Hufflepuff? He seems so much more like a Slytherin with wanting to be seen as better than everyone else,” said Hannah in a snide tone.

“Not outside the Sett!” corrected Susan sharply. “Remember what Professor Sprout said that first night. We are a family.”

“What does that have to do with me talking about how Smith is a-“

“Hufflepuff is a family. And family issues should stay in the family. Anyone could hear you talking in the halls. It’s not right to badmouth your own family where an outsider could hear.”

This was news to Harry. All his life his so called family hadn’t done anything but badmouth him to anyone and everyone who would listen. But everyone who knew about his home life kept telling him that the Dursleys were not a good example of family so maybe this was just one more example of that.

“Really?” questioned Hannah. “I’ve never been told that. You should hear my mum go on about her brother after every time she visits her parents. And I don’t think it matters to her who is around at the time.”

‘Or maybe not,’ thought Harry.

Susan looked around the entrance way as they came off the stairs from the lower levels. There wasn’t anyone else immediately in sight. “Your mum’s a muggleborn, Hannah. And the only magical in her family. Muggles might think differently. But for wizards and witches family is really important,” she said softly. “It’s a bit much to explain quickly. We can have breakfast and then if you want we can talk about it back in the dorms. But what your mum does, well, it’s considered really rude, and could be really bad if anyone not of the actual family is around.”

Hannah looked at Susan in surprise. “Okay, but I want to hear more about this. I don’t think Dad ever talked about it being a bad thing, and he’s been around a couple of times when Mum’s gone off.”

With that statement the four Hufflepuffs had reached the Great Hall and quickly found places at the table to start their breakfast.

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

As Harry settled at a desk in the first year quiet room to write the essay Professor Snape had assigned him, he reflected on what Susan had explained once the group got back to the dorms. Families had innate magic that flowed between the members of the family and could be shared by those who shared blood relations. In addition to providing a well of magic that the Patriarch of the family could draw on in times of need, this pool of family magic tended to have a memory of sorts for certain magical gifts. So you saw families that had a higher percentage of great Potion Masters, or Battle Mages, or other talents beyond the average witch or wizard. But for the Patriarch to be able to draw on the entirety of the family magic there had to be a true sense of family. And badmouthing a member of the family to outsiders could damage that sense of family. The magic could see it as a rejection of the person being badmouthed, or as a rejection of the family by the person doing the badmouthing. Either way it could be damaging to the well.

Susan had gone on to explain that while someone who married into the family wouldn’t necessarily have that same impact on the family magic directly, marriages were often calculated to try to bring specific gifts into a family line, with contracts that might spell out a minimum number of children expected and if those children were going to remain with the paternal or maternal family lines – while children going to the paternal line was normal and expected in most cases, there were spells that could give a child to the maternal line instead so a family’s magic wasn’t completely absorbed into another line if there weren’t any men left in the family. Susan said her aunt was teaching her about it because that was the case for the Bones. All that was left was her and her aunt, so if the Bones family was to continue not only would whoever Susan married have to agree that at least one child would take her name instead of his, but her and her husband would have to perform those spells to make the child truly a Bones after birth.

All this meant that family was incredibly important to wicca. And that to talk badly about a member of the family to anyone not of the family was a really bad idea. Hence Susan’s automatic shut down when Hannah was talking badly about Smith in a public area. Susan had taken the whole ‘your house is your family’ to heart with two different professors talking about it that first day, first Professor McGonagall when they were lining up to be sorted and then again by Professor Sprout during the house meeting.

Susan had never heard of anyone being able to draw on magic from someone they were not blood related to, but she still could not bear to talk bad about anyone from Hufflepuff where a non Hufflepuff might hear.

Harry thought about his situation – he was the last Potter, but he knew that he had ties to other families from his blood. He was obviously related to Slytherin (and somehow to Lord Voldie as a result – horrifying thought that), and had been told that morning he had a connection to the actual Hufflepuff family (as opposed to being a Hufflepuff based on his sorting). And maybe that had something to do with Professor Sprout’s insistence that the house was a family, considering that he remembered that Helga supposedly had a lot of descendants around. He wondered how far removed someone had to be before they couldn’t draw on this well of family magic any longer. And how a Patriarch was chosen. Lord Voldie was older, but Harry was the acknowledged Heir. Did that mean that Harry was the Patriarch? Would he eventually become the Lord of Slytherin? And what did that mean?

Well, whatever it meant would come to nothing if he didn’t get this essay written for Professor Snape.

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

A few days later, as Harry was placing his completed potion on Professor Snape’s desk, the vial seemed to shimmer for a minute and then it tipped over and rolled off the desk. It rolled toward the Professor, and Harry was not able to reach across the desk in time to catch it, partly because it was rolling away and partly because his hand ran into the Professor’s arm as he stood and also reached for the rolling vial.

“Detention Potter, for being careless with your work. That will also be a zero for the assignment.”

Harry started to open his mouth in protest and then closed it. He was trying to think more before he spoke, as that was a big point Gerald kept hammering at him, and he could question what happened during detention when there wasn’t a crowd of other students within hearing distance. He wasn’t sure, but he thought he saw an approving quirk to the Professor’s mouth when Harry didn’t say anything.

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

“Reporting for detention as ordered, Sir.” Harry said as he entered the potions classroom.

“And on time as well, I see. Come.” With that, Professor Snape stood up from his desk and walked swiftly towards the same wall Harry remembered from the first private meeting Snape had had with him. Again, the archway formed after the Professor spoke a short phrase, and the two walked through the wall into the smaller room. Professor Snape waved at the same chair Harry had used the last time as he walked to the desk in this room and sat down.

“I wish to talk about this Room of Requirement you were told about,” Snape started off. “Using the somewhat less than useless instructions you provided,” here he tapped on the parchment on the desk, marked up with as much red ink as Harry was used to from his actual assignments. “I was able to find and get the room to open for me several times in several different configurations. I am astounded that you managed to refrain from attempting to explore it on your own.”

“Um, okay. I guess we are talking about that but what about my grade! I worked hard on that potion today.”

Snape raised an eyebrow. Harry squirmed in his seat. After a few moments with Harry biting his lip to keep from saying anything else, Professor Snape relented. “I actually switched out your vial for another before making it roll off the desk and break. You will be graded fairly on the potion you turned in. But Albus has ways of monitoring all classrooms so my behavior while in that room will reflect the fact that we must not let him know we are working together. He may be watching and listening at any moment we are together in that room.”

Harry’s eye’s widened at that information. “So I guess he can’t see in here. Won’t he get suspicious that we moved?”

“I have long cultivated a habit of bringing students into this office when I wish to be particularly vicious in my lecturing, prompted in part by making a student cry my second year as a teacher and having another student who was passing by in the corridor overhear and accuse me of torturing the first student. It was a most unpleasant business. Of course the other part prompting this habit was to ensure I had a history of bringing students in here for privacy thus providing cover for any conversations I might wish to conceal from the Headmaster.

I did agree to have monitoring spells put in place in this room to ensure I do not physically harm or even touch students while in here alone. Preventing abuse of that sort is the main reason the headmaster has the ability to monitor classrooms at any time instead of just during scheduled classes. Regardless, I watched the monitoring spells be put in place on this office and unlike the ones in the regular classrooms that are also to be used to observe the teachers without the students being aware of the observation, these monitoring spells do not transfer sight or sound, just report if there is physical contact, the duration of any contact, and what body parts are involved in the contact. Because professors are allowed greater control over their private offices then they are of their classrooms, I would know if any additional monitoring spells had been put into place. Now if your curiosity has been assuaged, perhaps we could return to discussing the Room you were told of.”

“Um, okay. So you checked it out and it was fine. Can I start using it now?”

“What are you intending to use it for? You have your trunk for privacy when you wish to practice, with a dedicated tutor to boot.”

Harry started to speak, only to find nothing was coming out of his mouth. This must be covered under the wards not to share information. “I can’t say.”

“Of course you can’t. You can’t say who you met with. You can’t say what he or she wants you to learn. What can you say?”

Harry thought for a few minutes. “The ones – hey, I can say I met with more than one person! I met with five people. There were ---“ Harry’s voice was silenced again when he tried to say it was 3 men and 2 women. Oh well. “They were ---“ And he couldn’t get out that they were portraits either, dammit. “Okay. Maybe I can just be less detailed. The ones I met with want to help me get better at a lot of things. They want to have me use the room for different things to teach me stuff I won’t learn in normal classes but that Gerald can’t teach me. They want me to get more experience in ---“ This was getting really old, really fast. Though he maybe shouldn’t tell the Professor he was supposed to use the room to practice combat against an actual person rather than just practicing the forms the way he did with Gerald in his trunk. Professor Snape would probably think that was dangerous and tell him not to do it. Particularly since Harry wasn’t quite clear on how this room was going to give him a person to fight against without bringing someone else into the secret.

Harry stopped trying to speak and just looked at his Professor with a frustrated expression on his face.

“Perhaps if you cannot speak about what you are to learn, you can show me what you are to learn. There are no portraits in the immediate vicinity of the entrance of the room, and if we are careful we should be able to meet there with no one the wiser. You would then set the room for something you are supposed to learn or practice, and I will simply enter with you and observe.”

Harry thought about it. “I’m not sure that will work, I may not be able to properly think about setting the room if someone else is there to watch.”

“It is worth attempting. Sunday morning, directly after breakfast. An early breakfast.”

Harry decided he was never going to get to sleep in, ever again. He also decided he had better think seriously about what he wanted to show the Professor well before Sunday morning rolled around. Because if he started off with the combat training exercises Harry was sure it would go very poorly.

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxox

The next Sunday Harry got up early yet again, ate a quick breakfast and after looking around briefly to see if anyone was paying him any special attention, made his way to the stairs and then up to the seventh floor. He hadn’t seen the Professor at breakfast, but figured that wasn’t his business. He was told go to breakfast early and then up to the Room, so that was what he was going to do. Finally.

Harry reached the tapestry of trolls being taught to dance (and really, wicca were just totally mental sometimes) and started pacing back and forth. As he paced, he concentrated on needing a place to examine the wards, and understand what they were supposed to look like versus what they currently looked like.

After his third pass by the tapestry, an old looking dark wood door appeared in the blank wall opposite. Harry turned, opened the door and started to enter. As he did, he felt an unexpected wash of air at his back, like a breeze, but there was no way there should be a breeze there. Harry immediately dove to the side of the room, drawing his wand as he did so and twisting his body around to keep an eye on the area by the door he had just passed through. The door closed, and a voice spoke.

“Do calm down, you idiot child. I believe I told you I would enter with you to observe.” As the professor spoke, there was a ripple in the air and his form became visible. “Since you were concerned about not being able to concentrate on setting the room correctly if you were being watched, I choose to remain concealed, trusting in your still somewhat reckless nature to go ahead and enter the room on the agreed upon schedule even without confirming my presence.” Harry got a glare along with that last statement. “I was not incorrect in my supposition.”

Harry just straightened and turned to see what the room had provided to him. His jaw dropped as he took in what he was seeing.

In the left side of the room was a small library set up, with a few shelves of books, a desk with matching chair, and another more comfortable looking chair with a small table by its side. Each of the chairs had a dedicated lamp to give focused light – the desk chair had a banker’s lamp on the desk, and the armchair had a floor lamp standing next to it opposite where the small table was.

But it was the right side of the room that was commanding Harry’s attention, and as he noted briefly from the side, the Professor’s as well. There were two small models of Hogwarts set up – each coming up to about Harry’s chin in height and about as wide as his outstretched arms would reach. But what was so amazing was the aura of shimmering lights that surrounded each model. In different colored layers, the models were absolutely covered in light. One model had significantly less colors showing, and the ones present looked faded and washed out. The model of Hogwarts covered by these layers was clearly visible. The other model was barely recognizable as Hogwarts beneath the dome of multicolored bright light that shone so brightly it was hard to look at directly and nearly impossible to see through to verify these layers were also covering a model of Hogwarts. In fact, Harry at this point was mostly assuming that the form underneath the second dome was Hogwarts as it was so hard to make out. But it made sense. He had asked for a way to compare the wards from what was to what should be, and this was a pretty impressive showing of the difference.

“What did you ask for?” asked Professor Snape.

“I wanted to see the wards. What shape they are actually in, what they really should look like if the Headmaster wasn’t messing around with them, and information on how to understand what I was shown.”

Professor Snape walked over to the bookshelves and started scanning titles. “Did you know you would be given books that don’t exist?”

“What?”

The professor pulled a volume off the shelf. “ _Integrating Disparate Wards into a Consolidated Layered Ward Schema_ by Rowena Ravenclaw,” He read off the cover. “To the best of my knowledge, while Rowena Ravenclaw left behind a multitude of written work documenting her lifetime of impressive research and experimentation, she did not author any books on warding. At least not any that have survived to the present age. Yet here in my hand is a book that purports to be just that. A book on warding authored by Rowena Ravenclaw. And written in modern language as well no less. Something that does not exist outside of this room.”

Harry blinked in surprise. “Um, no?”

“Are you telling me or asking me?”

“Sorry, professor. No, I did not know the room could give me books that weren’t available anywhere else. That’s pretty cool, though.”

The professor, who had opened the volume and was paging through it, reached up with the hand not holding the book and pinched his nose. “Cool is not precisely the word I would have chosen to describe this phenomenon.”

“Sorry professor.”

Harry heard a faint sigh before Professor Snape resumed speaking. “Well, I presume that model is indicative of what the ward schema should be,” he said, waving his hand toward the brighter model. “While this one is displays what it actually is today.” He waved at the other, more muted display for that.  “While it is all very … pretty I supposed, how are you going to tell exactly which wards were deactivated or reduced in strength?”

As soon as Snape had finished speaking, there was a brief flash of light and a blackboard appeared between the models and the chairs. At the top it was labeled Ward Comparison, with the words ‘touch a ward with your wand to compare’ directly below. The main body of the blackboard was divided into two sections, one labeled current status and the other labeled description and optimal status.

“Wicked!” said Harry. The Professor didn’t say anything, but walked over and touched one of the wards on the brighter display that did not seem to exist on the more muted model.

Writing immediately appeared on the blackboard. Under the ‘touch a ward with your wand to compare’ but above the subdivided sections appeared the words ‘Were Alert Ward’. Under the current status side was just listed one word – ‘deactivated’. Under the description and optimal status section it said ‘Designed to identify and track were-creatures for containment during the full moon or other triggering event, this ward should at minimum be active when students are present and ideally should be left up at all times. Tracking feature can be tweaked to give notice to all those connected to the wards or solely to the house elves connected to the wards. It can also be set to display weres’ locations on the Master Map of the premises. Current location of the Master Map is the Headmaster’s private study.’

“ **Really** wicked,” breathed Harry with wide eyes. “How do I learn how to reactivate different wards?” As Harry finished speaking, the bookcase as a whole briefly flashed, and then one book (not the one still in Professor Snape’s hand) lit up. Harry walked over to the bookcase and took it out to review.

After a bit when Professor Snape did not say anything, Harry looked up and found him still standing in the same place just staring at the blackboard.  “Professor, do you think you could look at this with me? I think I get what it is telling me to do to turn back on a ward that already exists, but I want to make sure.”

Professor Snape shook himself briefly and finally turned from staring at the words on the blackboard. “I do not think you are going to be able to reactivate the wards. Only someone recognized as having authority in the castle could—“ The Professor abruptly stopped speaking and stared hard at Harry. “You are already connected to the wards,” he stated flatly.

Harry was a little confused. “Um, yeah. I did remember to write that down, didn’t I? I know I said it when you grabbed--.”

“And you are allied with the goblins,” Snape continued, ignoring Harry’s rambling.

“Yes.”

“And is this alliance by treaty obligation?”

Harry bit his lip at that question but figured he’d come this far. “Yes.”

“You are an heir of Slytherin.” This was said as a statement, but with a faint air of disbelief.

Harry cringed a little but said gamely “I’m told at the moment I’m the only recognized heir of Slytherin.”

“The only recognized Heir. So the Dark Lord is not the Heir of Slytherin?”

“Um, he’s a descendant, but not considered **the** Heir because he never signed the treaty with the goblins, which is apparently a major requirement. I get the feeling he’s not considered an heir at all, really– doesn’t like him. Dammit.”

“Language Mr. Potter,” said Snape sharply. “How did you not end up in my house?”

“Um, I asked not to be? I’d met Malfoy and while he wasn’t a total prat he wasn’t really nice and I could tell he’d really annoy me if I ended up sharing a dorm room with him—“ Harry was rushing his words, trying to get out his explanation so the Professor understood it had nothing to do with Slytherin in general or the Professor in particular.

“Enough. I believe I am in possession of sufficient information to obtain a reasonably clear picture of what transpired before and during your sorting.” The next words out of his mouth floored Harry. “The ones you met with last week. They were the founders.”

Harry opened and closed his mouth several times, but nothing came out. He finally just spread his hands in a ‘what can you do’ gesture. He knew the Professor was really smart, but he hadn’t realized that the Professor would figure it out.

“You somehow met with the four founders of Hogwarts, plus one more since you said there were five total, portraits undoubtedly, and they recognized you as Slytherin’s Heir and gave you instruction on how to start fixing what is wrong with the castle’s wards. And apparently also made it clear that at least one of them, Slytherin himself presumably, doesn’t like the Dark Lord.”

Harry continued to try to say something, anything, about the founders or his meeting but was unable. Another voice was suddenly heard. “Ask for all of the founders.”

Snape turned so fast he seemed to apparate. On a previously blank section of wall near the bookcase a portrait of a woman was now hanging. Harry recognized Rowena Ravenclaw and blinked in surprise.

“How did you get in here?” asked Snape suspiciously.

“In one sense I’ve been here since the room was created. I put quite a bit of myself into it after all. But in the immediate sense, since I am the founder most responsible for the original ward design and implementation, this particular frame was created by the current configuration of the room when it was set a short time ago. It was simply not visible until I chose to let it be visible. Since this space was created originally as my personal workroom, I have a great deal of control regardless of the wishes of the one who sets the layout when calling it.”

“Rowena Ravenclaw then.”

“Quite. Now, ask for the rest of the founders so frames will be created for them to travel to.”

“I cannot imagine that no one ever tried that previously.”

“This room is not located or used frequently, and many do not think of it. For those that do, the request can always be made of course, but we are not forced to appear if we do not wish to. The room returns static frames with non-interactive portraits for those requests we decline to accommodate. Now if you would please, Sal is getting rather impatient and will no doubt be shortly attempting to share my frame if not provided with one of his own.”

“Very well. I require a way to talk to the Hogwarts Founders.” Nothing happened.

“Since you are not the one currently in control of the room as you were not the one to give the parameters, you would need to phrase your request in connection with the room’s initial set up concerning wards. Though a simple request to talk to the founders will not usually do anything unless that was the purpose the room was originally called for even if made by the current room controller. And even then it will not usually work, as previously stated.”

Harry was mildly surprised that Professor Snape glowered at the portrait when she corrected him. This was one of the legendary founders after all. But after a moment Snape reworded his request. “I have questions regarding the wards that I need all of the founders present to answer.”

This time there was another one of those flashes of light and 3 more frames appeared along the wall in line with Rowena’s. In very short order, they were filled.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So just to be clear, I do read and appreciate all the comments on my fics. I'm just terrible at actually responding to them. As always, this has been spell checked and read over a few times, but I have no beta so any mistakes left in are mine and mine alone.


	20. Meeting the Masters, Take Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Professor Snape meets the Founder's portraits, learns something upsetting, and Harry is bored. Later, Harry has a conversation where he is asked a very good question.

“When was this ‘were alert ward’ deactivated?” snapped out Professor Snape as soon as all four figures were visible.

“Not one for pleasantries then,” commented Salazar. “I think you can imagine very well when it was deactivated, but for confirmation it was deactivated the year you started, back in 1971, due to the Headmaster admitting a werewolf as a student. Completely unnecessary as the ward does not prevent weres from being in the school, it just notifies appropriate parties that they are present.”

Harry was shocked to see the Professor actually stagger a bit, before sitting abruptly in one of the chairs by the bookcases. He was also paler than normal, which was also saying something.

He didn’t know why the Professor was so upset by the fact there was an alert ward aimed at were creatures, but if there was a werewolf student in his year, Harry could only imagine that the Professor had had a bad experience at some point.

“Professor Snape, meet the –“ and once again Harry’s voice was abruptly cut off.  “Oh come on! You guys are right here! Why can’t I talk about you?”

“Calm down. If you think about it, you will understand.”

Harry just stared at the portraits on the wall, but the short exchange did manage to attract Professor Snape’s attention, and he stood up as he reentered the conversation.

“Mr. Potter, you had said you met with five individuals. I can only presume that the prohibition against discussing what you experienced in that meeting still holds as there are only four figures in these paintings. Whatever the secrecy spells were designed to protect must involve that fifth figure and therefore still be in effect.”

“Indeed. Our missing companion still wishes to maintain his privacy, which is why the spells have not been lifted. Unfortunately there is no way to lift the spells for only the four of us while maintaining privacy for the last,” commented Salazar Slytherin. “An unfortunate situation that was not anticipated at the time the spells were first applied to the meeting room.”

“Ultimately, that is immaterial to our purposes. In the summary document Mr. Potter created for me he wrote about a ward designed to prevent anyone under active possession from entering the castle grounds. What would be the effect if that ward was raised while someone under active possession was present within the ward boundaries?”

“You are thinking of Quirrell?” asked Slytherin.

“Naturally.  It is intolerable that the Dark Lord should have free reign within Hogwarts with access to the children in general and Mr. Potter in particular,” replied Professor Snape.

“Yes, well, you can blame your current headmaster for that foolishness,” snapped Rowena.  “In less than half a century he has utterly destroyed the effectiveness of a ward schema that had lasted nearly 1000 years at the point he became the primary decision maker.  For the most part the wards still exist, just inactive, but it’s not simply a matter of bringing the wards back up, for precisely issues such as Quirrell.  The real issue is that his meddling has changed some of the wards, not just rendered them inactive, so technically they can’t be reactivated as they are already active.  Those wards need to be fixed, and for at least one ward, designed to detect and detain anyone affected by soul rituals, the only way to fix it will have to be to take it down completely and then, somehow, reintegrate it back into the existing ward schema.

And since it was a ward layered about two thirds of the way into the original process of creating the ward schema that will be no easy task to accomplish and may end up requiring a large number of the wards to be removed and replaced in proper order! Something that Harry cannot do on his own. No one person could. It took all four of us plus a team of goblins to layer the wards over Hogwarts and the grounds when they were first implemented.” This rant, given in an angry but resigned tone, was completed as the other three founders shook their heads and rolled their eyes, clearly having heard it all before.

“Why is that ward in particular need to come down and brought back up? Why cannot it be corrected back to the original design?” shot back Professor Snape.

“Because of how badly Dumbledore corrupted it to try and have those marked with the Dark Mark that were in the castle tagged with different notification levels. He was trying to create an exclusion specifically for—“

“The Dark Mark is created in a soul ritual?” interrupted Professor Snape in an absolutely deadly tone of voice.

“You accepted it and didn’t know or understand its creation? Dumbledore was trying to create the exclusion so he could have you in the castle as a teacher while not suppressing it entirely, which is what he did on a temporary basis as he did for your interview and other meetings prior to your hiring. He also removed the detain function entirely and was trying to switch it to a notification process, which is what caused the extreme level of corruption to the ward.

But the mark you bear is clearly the result of a soul ritual, albeit one I am not familiar with.  However could you miss that,” ended Salazar, mockingly.

“It…He…The ritual was conducted in Parseltongue. I don’t think any of us understood it was a soul ritual. How can you tell?” Professor Snape sat back down again, clearly shaken by what he was hearing.

“Don’t be such a git, Sal. The classes on rituals, what they are, how they function, how to properly conduct them, were the first ones Dumbledore had eliminated. By the Morrigan, Sal, he convinced Headmaster Dippet to cancel or reduce in scope those classes even before he took over completely, back when he was just the assistant Headmaster. That was even before Riddle was a student, let alone Snape. What do you expect?” chided Helga. “Neither one could have received training here, and even though Riddle did manage to get some sort of training elsewhere it was obviously incomplete. I would imagine he actually developed the ritual he is using himself, out of a patchwork of other rituals and magic. It seems to be related to the old Lord/Vassel bond, but if that was the basis, it’s been vastly changed.”

“What does that mean for me, that I have a mark created in a soul ritual? Obviously you felt it was an issue if you had a ward designed to contain anyone in my position. You only tagged weres. If those affected by soul magic are detained on entrance, you must consider it more dangerous.”

There was a short silence as the founders traded looks. Finally Helga spoke again. “It can have several different effects and frequently more than one at the same time, but one of the most common, and therefore most likely and the one with the most significance to you, means that when he truly dies, you will die as well, being tied to his soul. These types of rituals have many foul and base uses and only a few legitimate ones, with some uses falling in a grey area between the two.

One of the more questionable uses was to create a tie between individuals to prevent assassinations. A young lord as yet without children, or the heir apparent, would have a tie to a relative such as a younger brother in the line of succession. The theory being that there was no reason to kill the lord or heir if the person who would then inherit would also immediately die.

It didn’t always work that way, and was sometimes used to wipe out an entire family name at once. When that happened, it was frequently combined with the forced kidnapping and marriage of the eldest daughter of the attacked line into the family line of the one that arranged the assassination to give a veneer of respectability to the takeover of the destroyed family’s land and assets.”

Rowena took over speaking at that point. “The reason we had such individuals contained was, at least for those in your position in the bond, less because we considered them a danger themselves and more because we wanted to ensure they were aware and accepting of the tie to their soul. Now if it was someone in the master’s position, that required investigation to ensure any ties were freely accepted. Because if the tie or ties weren’t accepted freely, that was illegal and the individual holding the master side of the bond would be detained for the proper authorities. Again, there were some grey areas as the bonds were initially created to be used after conquests to control new vassals, who of course would not have freely accepted such a bond. But there was a difference between a legitimate conquest and the enforced slavery of someone kidnapped, which is what we were trying to detect and correct.

But for those in the vassal position, if they had accepted the bond freely, or were a legitimate conquest, they would be added to an approved list the wards would recognize and be accepted and treated as normal. If they had not accepted the bond freely or as a result of conquest, we would offer to sever the bond.”

“Sever the…I do not know if it possible in my case, or even if it applies, as I technically accepted the mark freely but in ignorance of its true nature and purpose. If possible, I would like the bond severed.”

“I understand that this is of concern to you, but we have moved significantly from the original purpose of the conversation,” interrupted Salazar. “We are here to assist in reviewing the wards and determine how best they can be corrected back to the original design. Your mark, while I agree it is an issue that needs to be addressed, can wait.  Particularly as it need not involve my young Heir.”

Harry was the abrupt focus of Professor Snape’s attention. He held up his hands and attempted to make it clear (without opening his mouth to say anything) that he would never open his mouth and say anything about a Dark Mark (whatever that was), soul rituals, or anything he had heard in the past few minutes really.  The Professor snorted and turned back to the portraits.

Once he was facing them again, Rowena gave a nod and with a rueful look moved back on topic. “We also need to review tactics to ensure the Headmaster is prevented from further tampering with the wards, including stripping back out any corrections we make and damaging or destroying any of the other wards.”

Professor Snape took a deep breath and nodded in clearly reluctant agreement. He turned back to Harry. “You will need to be seen either back in your common room or out and about the castle no later than lunch. While we have this time, we should do what we can with the wards,” he turned back to the portraits. “Since you let me be aware of your presence, would you permit me to contact you through this room without Harry to discuss soul bonds, hopefully examine mine, and teach me what is required to sever the bond?”

Salazar took a long, serious look at Snape. “I cannot speak for all of us, as we are all individuals, but I would be willing to assist in this. We will need to schedule times, as for the most part we do ignore requests to appear in this room, but we can use one of the house elves as a go between to set times for meetings. I will have an appropriate one contact you this evening after dinner to introduce themselves so you know who to call when you want to request a meeting. Now, back to the wards. You’ve made a good start, but it is best to examine them in logical order, the order in which they were added.”

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

A few hours later Harry was convinced that wards were the most evil things ever invented – designed specifically to torment him. He didn’t really understand everything the founders and the Professor were talking about, but every so often they would ask him to do something with the secondary ward focus the Room had manifested for them. Other than that, he was trying to keep up but the conversation involved both Arithmancy and Runes – and those courses weren’t offered until 3rd year so Harry had zero exposure to them before today. He could follow a little of the Arithmancy by thinking of the math he had learned before coming to Hogwarts, but only a little, and runes were a total mystery.

So he was bored out of his skull, and every time he tried to pick up one of the books to start reading about wards in general he was pulled back as he was the only one who could actually do anything with the wards.  The professor could assist, but the ward focus would block any modifications from taking hold if Harry was not part of the spell working. And the Professor was bound and determined not to leave the room until at least the various notifications were modified to exclude the headmaster and turned back on so they would get advance warning when dangerous things were brought in going forward.

“Okay, I think we’ve done as much as we can today. We will need to find at least 1 additional trust worthy person to bring into the process to begin the next stages of ward modifications and restorations as the power requirements are too much for just the two of you. If Harry was an adult, already through his magical maturity it might be different, but for now he simply can’t channel enough power,” stated Rowena after a short discussion with the other founders.

“Finally!”

Professor Snape turned to look at Harry, who had flopped into one of the chairs and was sprawled back with his eyes closed.

“If something this basic and of this short duration wearies you so, I fear for your future job prospects. You will no doubt give up or collapse in exhaustion before being in the work force for a week.”

“Now Severus, he is still young, and he has been very patient and accommodating while we looked at the various options and tested what changes we could. It has also been quite some time since breakfast and I am sure as a growing boy he is more than ready for more food. I well remember my own brood at his age. I am surprised he didn’t try to get us to stop earlier, frankly,” said Helga in an indulgent tone, with a fond smile at Harry.

Harry cracked one of his eyes open. “Food?”

“It is past the morning tea break, and not yet time for lunch, but I am sure if you pop down to the kitchens the elves would be more than happy to fetch you a snack,” replied Helga, still smiling.

“Very well. I will cautiously reach out and see if I can identify anyone to assist. Probably through the goblins. They have multiple warders in their ranks already, and as they are allied with Potter they have a vested interest and responsibility in ensuring the wards are brought up to date.”

“And we will work on the wording of a secrecy oath to protect the various secrets that anyone being brought into this matter will unavoidably be exposed to,” commented Salazar.

“So we have a plan. I would suggest we meet as a group again next Sunday morning to review progress,” added Godric.

“My housemates are going to wonder what I am doing if I keep disappearing on Sunday mornings for hours at a time,” warned Harry. “We normally have a couple different study sessions scheduled on Sundays to make sure everyone is on track with homework and stuff. No one attends all of them, but if I miss too many of them, I’ll hear about it for sure.”

“I do not think your presence will be required next week, young Heir. As we cannot proceed until we have another wicca to provide additional power it will be purely a planning session. You are welcome to attend, of course, if you are interested, and I cannot see it lasting nearly as long as today’s efforts, but it is not required.”

‘Hey, that means I might be able to sleep in!’ “I don’t think I would be able to contribute much to the meeting at this stage.”

Professor Snape looked at Harry with a raised eyebrow, clearly doubting his stated reason for not coming, but not saying anything to call him on it.

“Well then, we founders will meet with the professor next week, and we will send you a message through Gerald as to when your presence will next be required,” concluded Rowena. “Good morrow, everyone.”

With that parting statement, the founders departed their frames, leaving Harry and Professor Snape alone in the room.

“While I am aware you have been instructed to use this room for more purposes than just working on the wards, and that you cannot share with me what those purposes are, I do expect you to remember your own statement and not spend so much time here that your housemates, or Merlin forbid the Headmaster, become suspicious.”

“I understand, Professor. I’ll be careful.”

“Very well,” finished Professor Snape as he made for the door, with Harry right behind him.

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

Later that day, after a productive study session in the Sett where one of the third years had sat with the first years to go over their transfiguration assignment, Harry asked Susan if he could talk to her for a bit.

“Sure, Harry. Let’s go sit over by the fireplace.”

“Um, I’d prefer one of the quiet rooms, if you don’t mind.”

Susan looked at him for a moment and shrugged. “Okay.”

They moved into the first year quiet room and took seats at the table. “What did you want to talk about?”

“So first… This is hard. Can I ask that you respect that I want to keep what I want to talk to you about private?” blurted out Harry in a rush.

Susan’s eyes widened a bit at that, but nodded her agreement.

“Okay. So I wanted to ask you a bit more about families, and family magic. Your talk about it the other day was the first I’d heard about it, and I didn’t know if there was any place I could maybe find out what the Potter family magic was strong in. I also wanted to talk to you about what you said about being nearly the last of the Bones family, and the lessons you’ve been getting from your Aunt because of it. I’m the last Potter. Is there something I should be doing or learning? I mean, I really don’t know if I have time to take on more work, but family is important, right? So maybe I should be doing or learning something?

I’ve been trying to find out what I can about my family, but it’s really hard. I found a few old magazines that mention my parents, there was a spread in Witch Weekly about their wedding, but there has to be a better way.”

“Oh wow, Harry. I didn’t even think about that. I mean, I know you’ve been pretty insistent on how you were raised muggle and new to the wiccan world, but I didn’t connect it to how that means you wouldn’t have any foundation or information on your family magic. That’s … What has your magical guardian been doing? Didn’t he or she ever talk to you this stuff?”

“Susan…This is still private, right?”

“Harry! I agreed to that not two minutes ago!”

“Right, sorry. But…Susan, I don’t think I have a magical guardian.  If you mean someone that is supposed to talk to me about magic and stuff. At least not one I can actually talk to. I have a legal guardian in the muggle world, and a different legal guardian appointed by the Wizengamot for the magical world, but I’ve never heard from or met with anyone calling themselves a magical guardian.

And I have … this is the bit that is really secret, Susan. I have yet another different fiduciary guardian because the goblins don’t recognize the Wizengamot appointed legal guardian because they say it wasn’t done right. There are questions that the Ministry aren’t answering about my named fiduciary guardian so the goblins won’t change who it is, or allow anyone else to act as my fiduciary guardian. Even though the Ministry says the person that my parents named shouldn’t be my fiduciary guardian any longer.  So I don’t know if I just don’t have a magical guardian at all or if it’s something like what’s going on with my fiduciary guardian and I have one but he or she is not available.”

“That’s… I’ve never heard of anything like that, and my aunt talks about her work – nothing private, mind you – she talks about her work over dinner to just sound things out. I didn’t really get a lot of it when I was younger, but I started to understand more as I got older, and she particularly would talk to me about cases that involved issues of guardianship for orphans since that’s why I live with her. My parents died in the war too, so my aunt took me in.

But I remember her telling me that when guardianship is contested there’s supposed to be a hearing with the Department of Child Welfare. She talked about it with me a few years ago because there was a challenge to her having guardianship of me right after my parents died, and she wanted me to understand why it was being brought up again in the papers. There was a case involving guardianship of a minor, and the paper was trying to say my aunt couldn’t be objective about it because of what happened when she got me. She got really mad.  But the thing is, if there are questions about your guardianship, why weren’t they settled in a hearing?  It’s been ages. And none of the stories she’s told have had different guardians for different things. That’s really weird.”

“I don’t know why it’s set up that way.  Or is working that way now, if it’s not how it was intended.  But there are a lot of strange things about who has authority over me, and I’m trying to get it all figured out.”

“Well, I can reach out to my aunt-“

“Not yet, please. I appreciate it, and honestly, I’m sure that at some point I will ask you to, but right now it might hurt more than it helps. And I can’t tell you exactly why. At least not yet. There’s just too much not settled and I’m sure to get yelled at for even telling you as much as I have. I can’t have your aunt making inquiries and stirring things up because it might mess up other things and investigations going on by … other parties.”

Susan’s eyebrows practically climbed into her hair at that.  “Who else is investigating this for you?”

“I can’t say. I don’t have permission. But I really want to learn more about my family, and now I want to know what family magic I might have and you are the only person I’ve ever even heard mention it. So I figured we are friends and I could ask you about it. And ask that you respect that I don’t want why I don’t already know talked about, even with your aunt.”

“Of course we are friends, Harry. I mean, I didn’t know you before Hogwarts like I did Hannah, and when you didn’t really mix much at first I felt a little annoyed, especially because… Hey, you said you were raised muggle, right? And I think I remember something about you didn’t know of the wiccan world before getting your Hogwarts letter?”

“That’s right. I don’t talk about it much anymore, but I wanted to make you all understand why I wasn’t what you thought I was. And I talked to Professor Sprout about it when we had our introductory meetings. I think I remember she said something about it as well, to support why I wasn’t what everyone expected and why I wanted to be treated effectively like a muggleborn, at least in terms of what I know about magic.”

“But what about your other mail?”

“Um, what other mail?” asked Harry.

“All the letters and cards and stuff people had to have sent you. I mean, I know I sent you a couple of birthday cards and small gifts over the years once I was old enough to understand that a boy my age had basically ended the war, but when we never even got a form letter back my aunt said you must be overwhelmed and that I could talk to you once we both got to Hogwarts. That’s why I was a little annoyed at first when you kept to yourself so much. But then you made such a big deal about not being the Boy-Who-Lived and all that I just didn’t think about it and concentrated on getting to know Harry the way you said you wanted. But I can’t have been the only person to send you stuff. So if you never got it, where did it go?”

Harry blinked at her for a minute. “You know, that’s a really good question.”             

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I continue to be amazed and thrilled at how people are responding to my story. Thank you so much. I am on vacation this week, and hope to have another chapter posted before I return to work. But considering that while I am not traveling we do have quite a few projects around the house to get done - including retarring the roof (flat roofs SUCK btw, and should be avoided if at all possible unless you live in the desert with no rain or snow) and rerunning the pipe from the bathtub outflow to have a steeper angle so it will drain better - I can make no promises.


	21. Mail Mayhem

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry follows up about his missing mail.

Susan spent not quite an hour going through some of the basics of what she knew about family magic with Harry. Nothing considered secret to the Bones family, mind you, but talking about what was considered public knowledge for what families were known for what types of magic, Potters were supposed to be really good at Transfiguration, for example, and explaining a little bit more about some of the things that the Patriarch might use the well of family magic for, like erecting really strong wards around family properties and whatnot.  Afterwards, they joined some of their year mates in games in the common room, and they all went to dinner as a group. Meanwhile, Harry was thinking about the mail question in the back of his mind.  He figured he had a pretty good idea on who might want to make sure he was kept as ignorant as possible.

So later that evening after turning in for the night, Harry climbed down into his trunk, being careful to not make much noise or disturb the curtains around his bed.

“Good evening, Gerald.”

“Good evening, Harry. This is unexpected.”

“Yes, well I was asked a very good question today that I thought I should ask you. Where did all my mail go?”

“Excuse me?” asked Gerald.

“I was talking to Susan Bones, and she mentioned that she’d sent me some birthday cards and small presents over the years. But I never received anything from her. She also said that other people certainly would have sent me stuff as well. So what happened to my mail? Why didn’t I get it, and where did it go?”

The portrait’s jaw actually dropped. Harry was rather proud of that. It was the first time he’d been able to stun his mentor in the months they’d been working together.

“You know, I don’t think anyone really thought about it.”

“Well then, I think it’s time we did think about it. And find out where it is, or if it even still exists and wasn’t just destroyed. Another thing. The goblins said they never had anything they could ever use against the Headmaster, even though they think he’s been effectively stealing from various orphans and families for years. I’ve been thinking about this most of the day. He’s my assigned legal guardian, and supposedly was the one that arranged for my living with my aunt and uncle, so he must have met me or had a hold of me for at least a little while after my parents were killed. If he did something to me that prevents me from getting my mail, or did something with my mail directly, is that a crime in the magical world? Because I’m pretty certain it’s a crime in the non-magical world.”

“That becomes a grey area. Your legal guardian has certain rights over you, and controlling or receiving your mail could be considered part of that. But he is not your guardian for financial matters, no matter what the Wizengamot thinks, so if he has been intercepting bank mail that puts him in violation of GOBLIN law. And by treaty, in banking matters, goblin law has precedence. That’s why the bank can refuse to acknowledge the headmaster as your fiduciary guardian, even though the Ministry says he is.

You’ve never received mail from the bank, correct?”

“Well, I received a package and letter from Director Ragnok back in August. The one he sent in reply to the letter I sent the bank asking about exchanging wizard money for non-wizard money so I could get back to the alley and try to get more information. But that came back with Hedwig after I sent her to the bank with my question in the first place.  Other than that package, no, I’ve never received mail from the bank.”

“Well then. Someone has violated Gringotts’ protocols that state bank mail may only be received and read by the account holder or acknowledged alternate. Your acknowledged alternate is in prison, and not allowed to receive mail. If the mail Gringotts’ sent out attempted to be delivered to Lord Black, it would have been returned to the bank as blocked or undeliverable. I do not believe that is the case, because if it was, I have to believe that the Director or someone else would have mentioned it to you over the summer while you were staying there.  And your accounts have statements that get sent out regularly, I think on a quarterly basis since there isn’t much activity on your accounts.  So where are they going? And more importantly, since this would be the more significant crime, are they being read by whoever is intercepting them?

We cannot just assume that the Headmaster is diverting your mail; we need to investigate and verify.  I do agree that he is the most likely candidate. I will take these questions and suspicions to the bank and an inquiry will be started. Very good work, Harry.”

“Thanks,”

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

Harry got up the next morning and went to breakfast and then classes as normal.  Considering how slow the investigation into his fiduciary guardian’s situation was going, he wasn’t expecting results on his mail any time soon.

He was very, very wrong.

Two days later, shortly after lunch started and the students and staff had served themselves an initial helping of food from the various platters and started to dig into the repast, the normal conversational buzz in the Great Hall was broken by a loud rhythmic thumping coming from beyond the entrance doors.  Students near the partially open doors started craning their necks, trying to see what was causing such an unusual sound, and other students further in the hall were turning their heads in confusion, not yet understanding where the noise was coming from. Their curiosity was soon answered.

The doors to the Great Hall were pushed fully open and what at first appeared to be an endless stream of armored and heavily armed goblin warriors started to march into the Great Hall.  The thumping was coming from the banging of the ends of their spears on the floor as they marched.  As they entered, they split into groups.  Some spread out along the perimeter of the Hall, and others marched up between the student tables.  As individual warriors stopped along the way to stand sentry, they stood straight with their spears resting on the floor parallel to their bodies. After the initial mass of goblin warriors entered, robed wizards started to enter, some in the red auror robes, and others in shapeless grey robes with hoods up, obscuring the faces of those so attired.  Two of the grey robed wizards stayed to flank the main doors, and the others moved up the hall to the front. The red robed aurors also moved to the front and spread out in the space between the top of the house tables and the dais the teacher’s table sat on.  By this time, the entire Hall was surrounded by goblin warriors, and more were standing sentry spaced out in between the house tables and in front of the head teachers’ table.

Dumbledore, who had stood up at the first entry, finally found his voice. “Exactly what is the meaning of this intrusion,” he thundered.

“Silence, wizard,” replied one of the goblins standing in front of the teacher’s table. A goblin that Harry belated recognized as Sharptooth.

“This is a school, and armed warriors have no reason to invade—“

Dumbledore’s voice abruptly cut off as one of the gray robed wizards shot a spell at him.  “You were instructed to remain silent at this time, Headmaster. All will be explained shortly.”

Professor McGonagall then spoke up. “Master Unspeakable, having armed goblins in the hall is clearly upsetting the students. Is this really necessary?”

“One moment, and it will be explained. And yes, it is necessary. Are all students and staff present in the hall, Assistant Headmistress?” came the calm reply.

“Professor Trelawney is not here; she rarely leaves her tower. Argus Filch, the caretaker is also not here. I am not certain of the students.”

“Please summon the missing staff. I would suggest sending an elf to request their attendance. I would also suggest requesting the house elves to seek out any missing students and ensure their presence as well. And instruct them that once that is accomplished, all house elves should also come to the Great Hall. Nothing will move forward until all sentient beings in the castle are present in the Hall.”

The low murmur of conversations between the students as different theories for the unusual occurrence were swapped back and forth grew perceptibly louder as that piece of information made its way around the tables. Meanwhile, Professor McGonagall after taking a moment to absorb the request did as she was asked. In short order, multiple pops were heard as house elves started to arrive in the hall, finding places along the walls in between the standing goblin warriors.

Headmaster Dumbledore finally managed to remove the silencing charm the Unspeakable had hit him with. “What exactly is going on?” He addressed his question to the auror standing closest to his position. The auror, the magical world’s equivalent of a police officer, looked over at the Unspeakable who had spoken with McGonagall.

The Unspeakable replied to Dumbledore. “It will be explained once all sentient beings from Hogwarts are in the Great Hall. It should not be long. You will wait calmly, or you will be silenced again.”

With that, not another word could be coaxed out of the grey robed wizard. None of the other invaders, Unspeakable, auror, or goblin, spoke either, all waiting for the missing beings.

A short wait saw the arrival in dribs and drabs of a few dozen students along with the caretaker Argus Filch. The buzz of conversation at the student tables had in volume a bit after the first stragglers made in it as they brought with them the information that there were more goblins, aurors, and Unspeakables out in the main entryway just inside the doors to the castle. They general thought was that they were waiting for something and the speculation what that could be was going wild. Then the shawled and spectacled Divination teacher Professor Trelawney made it into the hall The house elf escorting her popped to in front of the Assistant Headmistress. “Alls are in the Hall now.”

A goblin near the door stepped out for a moment and then came back in and resumed his post. Three more goblins entered the hall, shutting the doors behind them. As one, the goblin warriors around the hall thumped the butts of their spears on the floor, and there was a flash of light around every exit. As the three new goblins made their way up to the head table, Harry recognized Director Ragnok as the center figure.

Once there, Director Ragnok crossed his arms and nodded to the Unspeakable who had been talking earlier. The Unspeakable nodded back and spoke. “If the staff could please come around and stand in front of the students so everyone can be addressed at once.” There was a short pause as the teachers moved as they had been bid. Headmaster Dumbledore was clearly annoyed, but kept his silence as they moved. Once the dais was clear, the Unspeakable and Director Ragnok stepped up onto it in front of the Head table and turned to face the assembly.

The Unspeakable addressed the room. “Official bank correspondence has been blocked from the proper recipient. While there are valid reasons for that to occur, it is required that when delivery is not permitted that the correspondence be returned to the bank unopened. That has not occurred.  Official bank correspondence has been opened by someone not authorized to do so.  The breach has been identified as occurring at Hogwarts, but the actual culprit could not be determined remotely.   As per the Goblin Treaty of 1760 that ended the 18th century goblin rebellion, the perpetrator will be identified and remanded to the Goblin race to stand trial in their courts for the violation.  We have gathered all potential culprits here to determine the responsible party.”

The hall erupted.  Practically everyone felt they had to respond to that statement, and everyone that felt that way did so at full volume. The noise was overwhelming. Harry just sat still, wide-eyed at what his simple question from a few days earlier had caused. He looked around and caught Susan staring straight at him from her spot across the table and two seats down the bench. “?” she asked. Harry couldn’t hear her question over the cacophony taking place around them, but was pretty sure she was asking if it was related to his mail. He raised his hands and gave a shrug, trying to indicate that he had no idea what caused this. He didn’t want anyone to think this extraordinary happening was in any way related to him, but wasn’t sure he was going to be able to maintain that privacy.

Suddenly a cannon blast of sound came from the front of the hall.  “Silence!  The treaty requires any suspects to be remanded to the goblins for trial, and if determined as guilty, for justice. The aurors and Unspeakables will work together to determine who the suspect or suspects are, and the goblin warriors will take immediate custody. This is not open to debate.”

“Surely this is not necessary. I am positive whoever opened the mail meant no harm-” started Headmaster Dumbledore, only to be interrupted by the Unspeakable who seemed to be the spokesperson for what was happening.

“Harm is not the issue. This is required by the treaty, lest we risk another rebellion.”

“It does not matter what the intentions were. It is a violation of our law.” Director Ragnok added, speaking flatly.

“But to disrupt the school this way, and upset the students. Surely it could have been handled quietly with a simple inquiry?” retorted Dumbledore.

The Director just stared back at the Headmaster, and didn’t say another word. Dumbledore tried again. “Why don’t we adjourn to my office-“

This time it was the Unspeakable who responded. “Headmaster Dumbledore, all sentient beings are in the hall so aurors and Unspeakables can assist the goblins as they search the castle for the compromised mail without interference.  Since at the moment everyone who is at Hogwarts is a potential suspect, moving anyone out of the hall for any reason would be considered interference.  Additionally, the goblins are being very patient and accommodating to our procedures considering their normal response to violations of their laws. And by treaty, since this is a banking matter, their law has precedence. You will not interfere with the process.”

The Headmaster looked disappointedly at the Unspeakable as he continued his questions. “Really now, what will locating this allegedly compromised mail show? How would finding a piece of opened, and no doubt subsequently discarded, mail identify anyone? If someone received something from the bank in error-“

Director Ragnok interrupted again. “There was no error. It had to have been a deliberate diversion.  Gringotts does not make errors in mail delivery where banking information is concerned.  And if you continue to question, protest, and try to interject yourself into the process of an official investigation, I will request the right to charge you with willful interference under goblin law.”

That shut Dumbledore up at last, but caused the rest of the staff, who had been listening quietly to the back and forth, to start talking amongst themselves. The students at the front of the house tables close enough to hear the exchange also starting talking again, having quieted to listen in as well. Mostly those students were repeating the gist of what was said, in particular the threat to charge the Headmaster under goblin law, down the tables.

The Unspeakable who had been explaining matters earlier did add one more comment. “Once the compromised mail is located, the aurors and Unspeakables will determine based on the location the mail is found and what magical signatures are on it who in the hall needs to be questioned to accurately identify the responsible party, which is another reason why everyone must remain here until released.”

The students continued to discuss and debate the most exciting thing to happen this year. Most felt this was better than the troll, because they could see part of it with the goblins all over the hall, and because they weren’t in danger if they weren’t the one that opened this missing piece of mail.  The teachers also spoke quietly amongst themselves, though at least one of them had thought to throw up some sort of silencing charm so all the students were hearing was a muted buzzing noise and not actually any of what was being said.

After a bit of time, Professor McGonagall stepped out from the mass of teachers and addressed the Unspeakable who had been doing all the talking for the wizards. “How much longer is this going to take? The lunch period is nearly over and students have classes.”

“No one will leave until the search is finished.  Classes are canceled until further notice.”

“And if this drags on until dinner? You have all the elves in the castle here. Who will prepare the evening meal? And what about sleeping? Bathrooms? Have you thought about any of that?”

“We were informed during the planning for this investigation that you are able to transfigure individual loos for the students off in a corner. You will do so now and they will be monitored by aurors,” came the calm reply.  “Should the search take long enough that dinner becomes a requirement, we will have outside elves come to the castle with a meal for the students and staff. It may not be the normal variety students are used to, but it will be sufficient. I do not anticipate it will be an issue, but we will ensure basic necessities are met should it come to that.  But your comment on facilities is noted, and that should be taken care of sooner rather than later when the need might become urgent.”  The Unspeakable then called out to an auror standing nearby. “Auror White, please walk with the Assistant Headmistress to what area she deems appropriate and monitor her spell work as she creates two basic bathrooms, one for boys and one for girls. Ensure the goblins in whatever area she chooses understand this is approved for the comfort of the waiting students and staff so they do not object.”

“Of course. If you would lead the way, Assistant Headmistress?”

With pursed lips and a stern look on her face, Professor McGonagall turned and strode off to one of the side walls.  She stopped toward the front of the room, just about even with the start of the house tables, and waited to start until after the auror had a short conversation with the goblins posted along that section.  Once she finished setting up the temporary loos, she used the amplifying charm _Sonorus_ to make her voice audible to the entire hall. “Students, as with what happened on Halloween when you were kept in here for a time for your safety, there are temporary facilities set up in this section of the hall for use as needed. Be sure to let the goblins in your area know you have a need, come straight here and return straight back to your house table when finished to avoid any confusion or misinterpretation of motive.”

As with at Halloween, a small but steady line soon formed for using the magical temporary loos that had been set up.  The rest of the students continued to come up with various theories over what mail had been tampered with, who it belonged to, and who would be so foolish as to intercept and read bank mail not intended for them.  The general consensus was it was not wise to get on the goblins’ bad side, considering the mass of warriors visible in the Hall.

Through it all, Harry tried to keep his head down and was only participating minimally in the discussions around the table.  Susan kept trying to get his attention and he was avoiding her as much as he could while having to stay pretty much seated in the same area.  He really did not want anyone to figure out that he had anything to do with what was going on if he could help it, even though he was pretty sure this was about his missing statements. Thankfully Susan was respecting his earlier request for privacy and not actually asking him questions in such an open environment. He expected to get an earful once they were back in the Sett, though.

Harry snuck a look up toward the teachers, still standing in a loose huddle at the front of the room, and caught Professor Snape staring right at him. He immediately put his head back down, breaking eye contact. ‘Professor Snape does not look happy.  I have to wonder if the goblins didn’t bother to warn him about what was going to happen, even if they have some faster form of communication.  Either they didn’t warn him and he’s pissed, or they did warn him and he’s acting. Or they warned him and he’s pissed anyway. Can’t tell with him, really.’

After a few hours, shortly before the normal start of dinner, there was a loud, firm, knock on the Great Hall door. All the goblin warriors around the perimeter banged their spears as one again, as they had when the doors were closed earlier. There was another flash of light, and the doors to the Hall opened. A small group of individuals comprised of two goblins, two aurors, and one Unspeakable entered and walked to the front. Once there, they erected a silencing charm and spoke to Director Ragnok and the lead Unspeakable.  A few minutes later, the lead Unspeakable turned and beckoned for the Headmaster to join them.  Looking both disappointed and annoyed, the Headmaster stepped over into the small huddle.  By this point, everyone in the hall had quieted down and was looking to see what was going on.

While nothing could be heard, it was clear that the Headmaster was being questioned about something, and being shown some sort of papers by one of the goblins.  The Headmaster was shaking his head, and looking angry.  One of the aurors held out his hand, clearly asking for something from the headmaster, and the goblins who were part of the group looked like they were readying themselves to attack.  The Headmaster abruptly appeared to say something short, and he raised one of his arms above his head.  There was a bright flash and a phoenix appeared. Dumbledore grabbed onto the phoenix’s tail feathers, there was another flash, and the phoenix and the Headmaster disappeared.

The students in general went nuts. There was hand-waving, there was shouting (mostly in protest of the thought Dumbledore might be at fault, but some seemed to be in support of dragging him away), there were even some students that burst into tears. It was a total mess.  After a short period, the lead Unspeakable again shot off a burst from his wand that sounded like a cannon.  “There will be silence!”

With the trailing sound of a few sniffles from the students that had been crying, the cacophony died off into the demanded silence.

“Thank you.  Now, while it is unusual to comment on ongoing investigations, since events were so public I will make a short statement. The intercepted and opened mail was uncovered in a location that implicated Headmaster Dumbledore as having at minimum some sort of involvement or knowledge, and at maximum being the sole culprit responsible for the tampering. He was informed of the findings, and his wand was requested prior to his being turned over to the goblins to face investigation under their courts. As you all observed, when the request for his wand was made, he refused and called his bonded phoenix to affect his escape. As such he is now to be considered a fugitive. By our treaty obligations to the goblins, no wicca is to provide assistance or shelter to Albus Dumbledore, and any sighting must be reported to the Ministry and Gringotts so he may be apprehended and remanded to face the trial he fled from. As such, I am immediately suspending him from being headmaster at Hogwarts.

For the time being, I am declaring the Headmaster’s office off limits. It will be blocked off for a more thorough search and only approved individuals may enter. No student or staff of Hogwarts will be on the approved list, don’t even ask.  The Hogwarts staff will be questioned individually to determine if they had any knowledge or involvement with his mail tampering, but that can be done hopefully without further disruption.  As no house elf magic was detected during the investigation, at this time, I am releasing all the house elves back to their duties so they may start on dinner.  Student involvement in this matter is considered highly unlikely, so students are instructed to remain here through dinner, at which point we hope to have sufficient staff cleared of culpability that the normal school routines can continue and you may be released to go about your evening.  Thank you.”

The noise level in the hall rose again, though not to the previous level, as the students started discussing what they had just been told.  But it soon dropped off again as the mixed group that had entered the hall, plus the lead Unspeakable, made their way over to the Hufflepuff table and specifically to Harry Potter.

“Mr. Potter?” asked the Unspeakable.

“Yes,” replied Harry.

“We need you to come with us, please.”

‘Well, I figured keeping my involvement out of it was long shot’ “Okay.” Harry got up from the bench and started following the group as they turned and made their way toward a small side room off the Great Hall.  Professor Sprout, seeing what was happening, hurried over.

“What is going on? Why do you need one of my students? You just finished saying students are not thought to be involved,” came her rapid fire questions as soon as she was within range.

“At this time, no student is thought to be involved in the mail interception and unauthorized access,” replied the Unspeakable, still moving.

After a beat, when Professor Sprout realized that was the entire answer she was getting, she tried again, walking in front of the group to block their passage.  “Mr. Potter is a minor, and as his head of house I must know why you are taking him away like this.”

The lead Unspeakable seemed to realize the entire hall was once again staring and whispering. He turned to Harry and raised a privacy spell. Professor Sprout made to get closer so she could hear, but was blocked by the goblins who were part of the group.

“Mr. Potter, the mail that was intercepted was addressed to you. As part of the investigation, we need to ask you some questions and record your answers. Do you want Professor Sprout is present during the interview?  She is correct that you are still a minor and entitled to adult support even if you are the victim and not at any fault, but she has not been cleared of any involvement at this time.”

“Um, I don’t really think she’s involved, but I could be wrong.  But I don’t know if I’m okay with her there because I don’t know what you are going to want to know, if that makes sense. I don’t have a problem with Director Ragnok being there, if that’s okay. He can be the adult support.  Maybe you can just let the Professor know what you just said? That because it was my mail that was intercepted so you need to talk to me about it? She should understand that.” Harry looked around the hall. “And maybe tell her not behind privacy wards so there aren’t any wild rumors about what you are taking me away for?”

The lead Unspeakable actually laughed a bit at that. “Yes, the infamous Hogwarts rumor mill.”  He dropped the privacy ward and turned to Professor Sprout.  He spoke in a clear voice that was not raised or magically made louder, but was still easily heard by a good chunk of the students in the front of the hall. “Professor Sprout, we need to interview Mr. Potter for additional information as it was his bank mail that was being intercepted. As you have not yet been interviewed and cleared of involvement, you are not permitted in the room. Mr. Potter has indicated that he is willing to trust in the known integrity of the goblins in all financial matters and, if he is amenable, Mr. Potter asks Director Ragnok to stand in as his adult support during the interview.”

Professor Sprout stood there blinking for a moment at that information before turning to Harry. “Mr. Potter? Is this your desire?”

“Well, you can’t be there, and I’ve been told the goblins are really strict when it comes to banking and money stuff. Since I’m the one that had their mail messed with, I’m sure the Director to wants to make sure everything is okay about it.”

“Well, if you are okay with it. I’d still rather it wait until myself or another teacher can be interviewed and cleared, but-“

“We need to interview Mr. Potter first, because his answers may indicate additional avenues of questioning when we do the teacher interviews. Which is also why no teacher may be present during his interview,” interrupted the Unspeakable. “Now, since your inquiry has been answered, we do need to conduct the actual interview.”

“Oh, of course,” said Professor Sprout as she stepped back.

“Director Ragnok, if you will join us?” continued the Unspeakable as the group started moving again.

Director Ragnok moved from where he had been still standing in the front of the hall to intercept the group as they reached the anteroom off to the side. The goblin that had been standing in front of the door stepped to the side, and another goblin from down the wall moved up so the door was now flanked by goblins on either side, clearly there to guard the entrance and ensure no interruptions while the interview was taking place.

Once in the room, one of the aurors waved his wand and a small table with a few chairs on each side materialized. The lead Unspeakable motioned Harry to take one of the seats, and then sat facing him. The director took one of the chairs next to Harry, and the chairs on either side of the Unspeakable were filled with aurors. Two of the goblins from the original group stepped back and flanked the door on the inside, while the remaining goblin took a chair on the other side of the Director.  The last person in the room, the Unspeakable from the original group, moved the remaining empty chair from next to Harry to one of the ends of the table and sat down. He reached into his robes and removed a small glass sphere, which after sitting it in the middle of the table, he then tapped with his wand.

The lead Unspeakable sitting across from Harry started the interview. “It is 6:00PM on Wednesday December 4th, 1991. This is an interview with Harry James Potter, first year student in Hufflepuff House at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.  This interview is to determine what additional information Mr. Potter might have regarding the interception of official Gringotts correspondence that was addressed to Mr. Potter.  Mr. Potter, do you understand why you are here, and that this interview is being recorded?”

Harry nodded his head.

“While the recording is visual as well as audio, we do need you to answer all questions, even simple yes/no questions, verbally to be considered official. So again, Mr. Potter do you understand why you are here, and that this interview is being recorded?”

This time Harry spoke, “Yes, I understand.”

“Very well.  Mr. Potter, please list to the best of your knowledge what correspondence from Gringotts you have received in your lifetime.”

Harry looked sideways at the Director, who nodded back. Harry took that to mean it was okay to talk about the exchange of letters back over the summer.  “Um, I sent a letter to the bank asking about exchanging money after I found out I was a wizard and had a bank account there, and my owl came back with a reply.”

“Any mail sent to an individual using the individual’s personal post owl will be received unless the owl is attacked. It is not possible to set up a mail ward that will interfere with a personal post owl delivering mail to their owner. We are asking about official correspondence that would have been sent via normal commercial post owls, your bank statements, like these.” And he gestured to the goblin on the other side of the director, who pulled out papers with the Gringotts’ seal clearly showing at the top.

“But I’ve never received anything like that.  Hagrid coming to get me on my birthday this year was the first time I knew about being a wizard and the only mail I’ve ever received from Gringotts was the reply to my letter.  I never got anything from any wicca until after I got to Hogwarts, and really, I’ve only gotten one piece of mail since getting here.  It’s not like I would have forgotten getting mail from an owl. My aunt and uncle would have gone nuts, just like they did when my Hogwarts letters starting arriving. Heck, I didn’t get mail period before that first Hogwarts letter, so believe me, I would have remembered.”

“Mr. Potter…To be clear, you are stating, on the record, that you have never received any mail from … anyone.”

“Well, like I said, I got the reply when I sent a letter to the bank, and last month the day after Halloween I got a note at breakfast that said I did a good job by asking a prefect why the Headmaster was sending us toward the dungeon if that was where the troll was supposed to be. Oh! And I my Hogwarts letters, of course. There were a ton of those until I was finally able to open one. But that’s the only mail I can ever remember getting. Ever. Magical or non-magical.”

The Unspeakable sat back and Harry got the impression that he was being just stared at, even if the hoods on the Unspeakable robes meant that no one could really see their faces. The aurors were definitely staring at him.

After a pause, the Unspeakable resumed. “Mr. Potter, you are an internationally known figure. You would have been sent mail from everyone from normal wicca to government departments, to retail outlets, to news organizations. And you say you’ve never received it. Are you aware of where your mail might be?”

“My mail? Aware of where it might be? How could I be aware? I’ve never gotten any of it.” Harry looked at his interviewer with total incredulity on his face.

“Mr. Potter, please. You may not have ever received any of it, but your guardian might have discussed it with you.”

Harry instantly decided that there was no way for them to be aware that Gerald told him that Headmaster Dumbledore was considered his guardian in the magical world, and while Hermione had talked to him about the information in books she had read that also mentioned it, there was no way for them to know that either, so he was going to play dumb for that one. “My aunt and uncle would never discuss anything from the magical world with me. They tried as hard as they could to stamp magic out of me. They forbid any mention of magic, constantly said it was all ridiculous and didn’t exist. Heck, it seemed at times they wanted to believe I didn’t exist. They never talked to me about anything unless they had no choice, or it was an order to do something like clean the house or take care of the garden. They certainly wouldn’t tell me I was getting mail from wicca.”

“Your aunt and uncle may have custody of you, but they are not your magical guardian.  I was referring to your magical guardian,” said the Unspeakable in a patient tone.

“What magical guardian? I’ve never met anyone that told me they were my magical guardian. If I have a magical guardian, who is it, and why have I never met him or her?” shot back Harry.

There was a longer pause at that statement.

“Mr. Potter, Headmaster Dumbledore was assigned by the Wizengamot as your magical guardian after your parents’ murder.”

“Really? He’s never said anything about it.”

Another pause.

The Unspeakable appeared to take a deep breath, based on the body movement Harry could see. “Mr. Potter, Headmaster Dumbledore is your guardian in the magical world. However, according to Director Ragnok during the attempted apprehension of Albus Dumbledore, he is not acknowledged by the bank as your fiduciary guardian, which is why his presumed opening of your Gringotts’ statement or statements is considered a violation of goblin banking law and the reason we are all here today. So getting back on topic, Mr. Potter, you have stated that you never received any official mail from Gringotts.”

Harry nodded and said, “That is correct.”

“Headmaster Dumbledore is not your fiduciary guardian.  Do you have any knowledge of who your fiduciary guardian is?”

Harry looked at Director Ragnok again, and again received a nod in reply. He looked back at the Unspeakable. “Sirius Black is my fiduciary guardian.”

“Sirius Black? Sirius Black is in prison for murder and conspiracy to commit murder. Conviction of a high crime automatically disqualifies a person from acting in such a role. He might have originally been your fiduciary guardian, but he cannot currently be your fiduciary guardian.”

Director Ragnok cleared his throat. “Point of information. No record of Sirius Black’s conviction was ever presented to the bank, so he is in fact still considered to be Mr. Potter’s fiduciary guardian, regardless of his current accommodations.”

Both aurors and Unspeakables turned to stare at the Director. “How can he be a fiduciary guardian if he is a convicted criminal?” blurted out one of the aurors.

“If the Ministry would provide proof that he is a convicted criminal in the form of official court documentation the presumptive Lord Black would be stripped of his guardian status. However, no matter how frequently repeated, mere statements that the presumptive Lord Black is guilty are not sufficient to abrogate the wishes of Mr. Potter’s parents.  Gringotts is known for absolute integrity in banking matters.  We require official documentation to make changes in the absence of the actual responsible party making changes in person. The Ministry has failed to produce any such documentation, despite the fact that we request it every time an attempt is made to access either the Black or Potter vaults by non-authorized individuals.”

“And how often are such attempts made?”

“At least once a year since the previous Lord Black’s death for the Black vaults. The Potter vaults had several attempts made at different tellers on different days shortly after the Ministry assigned Dumbledore as Mr. Potter’s guardian, but after he was repeatedly refused access, the attempts stopped.”

“These attempts were by Headmaster Dumbledore?”

“The attempts to access the Potter vaults were made by Mr. Dumbledore.”

“And the Black vaults?”

“As that information is not relevant to the current inquiry, our confidentiality rules prohibit giving out the specifics,” replied Director Ragnok.

“You can tell us there were unauthorized attempts, but not who was making the attempts?” questioned one of the aurors.

“Since our continued requests for the presumptive Lord Black’s status are made as a result of the unauthorized access attempts, and his status is relevant to the current inquiry, I can share that such attempts were made and the approximate frequency. However, as the attempts themselves do not appear to relate to the inquiry at hand other than being the prompt for requesting the presumptive Lord Black’s documentation, I cannot reveal who made them,” came the calm reply. Harry wondered if the Director knew that Gerald had told him that it was a Lucius Malfoy that kept making the attempts, if that information was considered confidential.

“Why do you keep calling him the presumptive Lord?” asked the other auror.

“That is also not relevant to the inquiry at hand.”

“Perhaps, but perhaps not. While this is Mr. Potter’s interview, and the topic is unauthorized access to official bank documentation addressed to Mr. Potter, if Sirius Black is still his listed fiduciary guardian it behooves us to verify his status. And how you are addressing him might relate. So if you would not mind, why do you refer to him as the presumptive Lord Black,” asked the lead Unspeakable.

Director Ragnok paused for a moment in thought before answering. “We at Gringotts have never been provided with proof of the presumptive Lord Black’s guilt. No court documentation has ever been provided. So the bank has no option but to treat him as a member of the community in good standing. Additionally, while the common belief is that Sirius Black was disowned out of his family line, that is not quite correct. He was legally disowned by his parents as their son, yes, but Sirius Black’s father was not the Lord Black. The previous Lord Black, Sirius Black’s grandfather Lord Arcturus Black, never acknowledged the disownment or completed the disownment ritual required to disown Sirius Black from the family magic. 

In fact, after Sirius Black’s parents disowned their son, the prior Lord Black set up a vault specifically for Sirius Black separate from the various trust vaults established for children of the Black family so there could be no way for Sirius Black’s parents to prevent Sirius Black from accessing funds. Lord Arcturus Black also outlived his both his sons, so neither of them were ever in a position to disown Sirius Black from the family magic. After Lord Arcturus Black’s death three years ago, an attempt was made to have another individual recognized by the Black family magic as the Black family patriarch. That attempt failed.  The general belief among the senior management at Gringotts is that the attempt failed because the family magic views Sirius Black as the rightful Lord Black as the senior male of the line still living. As such, since the Black line lacks a formal patriarch at this time and the prior Lord Black’s will left the entire estate, minus the funds dedicated to the various trusts, to the next Lord Black, Gringotts continues to refuse all attempts to access any Black vaults other than the trust vaults until the matter is resolved. And in effort to see the matter resolved, Gringotts submits the aforementioned requests for the presumptive Lord Black’s documentation every time another attempt is made. 

At this point in time, we at Gringotts believe that Sirius Black is the rightful Lord Black, but his current accommodations have prevented him from completing the required rituals to have magic formally acknowledge him as such, though as previously stated we believe that he is nonetheless considered to be so by the family magic even without the formal rituals. So we refer to him as the presumptive Lord Black in the strong belief that should he come to be able to perform those proper rituals, magic will formally acknowledge him as patriarch and he will be able to officially take his place as Lord Black.”

Harry sat back and watched as the lead Unspeakable put his head in his hands, while the two aurors sputtered and shook in disbelief.  Maybe there would be some movement on his guardianship too, from all this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So the roof got patched, but not completely resurfaced, and the bathroom didn't get worked on at all but I had a nice vacation and did find some time to write, and it ended up being a longer than normal chapter for me since there was a lot going on.
> 
> Tomorrow it's back to work. Thank you again for all the kind kudos and comments.


	22. Interlude II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just a little glimpse of Dumbledore's reaction...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not long, but I am working on the next chapter and hope to have it ready by next weekend. As always, I am not JKR, and do not own Harry Potter.

‘How?’

Dumbledore paced furiously as he tried to think of what gave him away.

‘How did those blasted goblins figure out I was intercepting Harry’s mail like that? I’ve been doing it for years! There wasn’t anything different in the last statement, just the normal posting of activity, recording of investment income, listing of the quarterly fees…’

Dumbledore stopped his pacing at that last thought. ‘Listing of the quarterly fees…It’s barely December…The quarter isn’t over yet.  The statement came…early? Statements never come early.’

“Those bilge-drinking, snipe-sucking, treacherous little sewer rats!” yelled Dumbledore to the silent, spare surroundings of his safe house. “It was a trap! That last statement was a trap! How dare they!”

Even more furious than he had been before, Dumbledore turned on his heel and stalked to his workroom. ‘I am not going to submit to a goblin trial! They have no respect for me and what I’ve done over the years. I am Albus Dumbledore! I am not some random no account wizard. I am the Leader of the Light! Why should I have to answer to those filthy creatures?’

He pulled out parchment and a quill. ‘I’ll challenge the attempted arrest because the so called crime is not a crime under wizard law.  Since I am Mr. Potter’s guardian, by wizard law reading his mail is not a crime. I am protecting my ward, not interfering with banking matters. I didn’t resist arrest, I prevented the aurors and Unspeakables from making a tragic error. The goblins have failed to update their records in accordance with Ministry directives, so they are the ones at fault. What does it matter that the Potter’s didn’t name me Harry’s fiduciary guardian. Black is in prison. I am the logical choice as replacement.’

He began to write the first of many, many, missives to go out to various individuals around magical Britain and in the ICW. Not to mention the Daily Prophet. He hadn’t gotten as powerful as he was without understanding the importance of public opinion.

‘Yes, this will quash any brewing scandal nicely, and make sure my name is once again at the forefront of everyone’s minds, this time for protecting the Boy-Who-Lived’s inheritance from those treacherous goblins, who no doubt want to prevent me, his proper guardian, from discovering their machinations.’

He chuckled in the silence around him, as he began to muse on further concessions he might be able to wring out of this temporary setback. Why, he might be able to finally get access to the vaults of some of the extinct lines that the goblin kept refusing him! Saying that he had no proof the lines were truly extinct, and had no claim on the vaults even if the lines had died out. What did that matter? He was the Leader of the Light, and should be given dormant vaults of dark families in gratitude of the many long years of service he provided. He needed to be able to search them for what artifacts were stored, to ensure they were kept in the proper (his) hands. It was all for the greater good, after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So just a short something, but it was ready so I posted. I love reading peoples reactions to the story, even if I am horrible at actually replying to comments. The next chapter should be back to what has become my norm of 4-5K word chapters.


	23. Unexpected Repercussions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wherein Harry's questions lead to more than he thought it ever would, and the goblins continue to be BAMF.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I do not own Harry Potter. I do however, own my ideas and prose.

Harry’s interview wrapped up pretty quickly after that little bombshell was dropped by the Director. He was instructed to go back to his house table, eat his dinner, and not discuss Sirius Black or any of the other information that came out in the interview with anyone until further notice. Harry had no problem with that.

He hoped to just quietly rejoin his year-mates without attention, but as soon as the door opened to let them back into the Great Hall the level of noise dropped, and the immediately rose again. Sure enough, when Harry made it out in the hall (being third to exit after Director Ragnok and the lead Unspeakable, while the others stayed in the room), everyone who had a direct line of sight was staring right at him. Harry ducked his head and made his way quickly back to the Hufflepuff table.  Once there, he could barely make out individual words as what seemed like the entire house started asking him questions, speaking over each other without regard for such things as social niceties.  Harry hunched down as far as he could on the bench, wishing he could just disappear.  Surprisingly enough, it was Susan Bones who put a stop to it.

“Enough guys! Can’t you see he’s overwhelmed? Besides, my auntie always told me that witnesses to crimes weren’t supposed to talk about what they saw or knew to help keep from getting confused or influenced by someone else’s thoughts or feelings. He really shouldn’t talk about it.”

“Can’t talk about it,” interrupted Harry at that point, since the rest of the table had quieted down as Susan lectured.  “I was told not to.”

“See, that’s exactly what I was talking about. So just leave him alone.” And the rest of the table grumbled a bit, but did go back to talking to each other instead of trying to question Harry.

“Thanks, Susan,”

“No problem. And I’m not asking you to talk about anything that happened in that room, but this is about something that was said before you went into the room. You haven’t been getting your Gringotts’ mail? Didn’t you wonder where your statements were?”

Harry looked up at Susan, puzzled as to why she would feel she needed to ask that when they had already talked about it a few days ago, and then it struck him that she might be giving him an easy way to make sure others knew about the issue with his mail too. He replied. “Susan, I’ve never gotten any mail from the wizarding world, other than my Hogwarts letters. I didn’t wonder about where they were because it never occurred to me that I should have been getting them to begin with.”

That set off another storm of gossip, and a new round of questions for Harry. He just repeated that yes it was true that he hadn’t received any mail from anyone in the wizarding world, and no, he couldn’t talk about it further because he had been told not to. After a little while of hearing him repeat that a few times the questions to Harry directly stopped. The discussion and questions around the hall though kept up, and as the newest information made its way around the room you could hear the occasional outburst of anger or disbelief above the general buzz of conversation.

As this was going on, the lead Unspeakable had requested Professor Sprout to accompany him back to the small room for her interview, and as dinner was served and students began to eat there was a steady procession of the various school staff in and out as each was approached to be interviewed in turn. The teachers who had finished their interviews were going up to the head table to be served dinner while the staff that were still waiting remained standing in front of the house tables. It was after Professor Flitwick was interviewed that the next bit of excitement occurred.

For each new staff member to be interviewed, the lead Unspeakable had approached the individual and escorted them to the room, and presumably when the interview was over and the teacher/staff person was cleared of involvement, the staff person and lead Unspeakable came back out for the process to start again. After Professor Sprout had come Professor McGonagall, then the school nurse Madam Pomphrey, then Hagrid, and then Professor Flitwick. All nice and smooth, even if none of the students Harry could hear talking could figure out why the order was what is was.  And since as the cleared teachers came back into the hall, they ascended to the dais and sat at the teacher’s table to begin their own dinners, none of the students could hear what if anything they were discussing about the matter.

But after Professor Flitwick was cleared and the lead Unspeakable approached Professor Quirrell the process came to a sudden halt. For as soon as it was clear that the lead Unspeakable was approaching the Defense teacher, Director Ragnok stepped forward as well and intercepted the Unspeakable. And when the Director stepped forward, the goblins around the room also moved.  The goblins nearest the front stepping away from the walls and forward from the aisles between the tables to physically form a line between the adults at the front of the room and the student tables, and the goblins further back in the room spreading out and forward so the walls and aisles still had goblins evenly spaced around the perimeter, if a bit further apart than previously.  The few goblins that had been standing near the teachers also moved, most to stand with the director, and the one that Harry recognized as Sharptooth moved to become part of the line between the students and teachers.

The director spoke very quietly to the lead Unspeakable for a moment, before stepping back just a pace to be in the center of the goblins that had moved to stand with him.

The lead Unspeakable turned back to face the Defense professor again, but did not continue moving forward to stand next to him as he had with the prior teachers he escorted for their interviews.

“Professor Quirrell, I am asking you to please surrender your wand before your interview is conducted,” said the lead Unspeakable. The rest of the teachers were looking at the interaction with curiosity, except for Professor Snape. Professor Snape was backing up a bit, and having grabbed a hold of Professor Sinestra as he moved, was whispering in her ear. Professor Snape also had drawn his wand and had it in the hand not holding onto Professor Sinestra’s arm as he moved them both backward and further away from Professor Quirrell.

“Wh-wh-why do you n-n-n-n-need my w-w-w-wand?” asked Professor Quirrell, who had drawn his wand at the request, but not surrendered it.

“Just a precaution. As the professor for Defense against the Dark arts you must be a formidable wizard.”

Various students giggled at that statement, as the stuttering professor was considered something of a joke in the school, particularly after he had fainted on Halloween.

Professor Quirrell however simply cocked his head to the side. “I had nothing to do with intercepting Mr. Potter’s mail,” he said, his stutter disappearing.

“That is what the interview is to determine. But while you may or may not be involved with the current investigation, I was just informed there could be other concerns, and I really must ask you to surrender your wand before we proceed any further.”

Professor Quirrell just continued to stand there, looking at the lead Unspeakable in front of him. But while his mouth didn’t move again, after a moment a reply was heard anyway. “I think not,” came the sound of a high pitched voice. “Quirrell, take us out of here immediately!”

The student body was suddenly cut off from whatever was happening at the front of the hall as Sharptooth barked “NOW!”, the goblins that had formed a line between the students and the teachers banged their spears against the floor in unison, and a large shimmering wall of light erupted from floor to ceiling spanning the entire width of the hall.   Several students called out in shock, and one of the ones closest actually stood up and tried to walk through, only to fail. It may have looked like pure light, but it was clearly solid to touch. Sound was also blocked, so no one could tell what was happening on the other side. Again, the student body went not so quietly nuts.

Sharptooth snarled “Silence,” in a voice that while not shouting was certainly loud enough to be heard throughout the hall. “You are being protected while the adults in the room deal with the issue. Remain seated and quiet. This should not take long.”

True to Sharptooth’s prediction, after no more than five minutes there was chiming sound coming from the wall of light and the goblin warriors in the line at the front once again thumped their spear butts against the floor. The shimmering light disappeared and the students could see the teachers and other adults once again.

Professor Quirrell was nowhere to be seen, and several of the other adults were on the floor.  Those closest to the front could see that there was also a body shaped object covered with a cloth lying on the floor. Professor Flitwick was sitting on the edge of the dais, holding a wad of cloth to his shoulder. There was a line of blood along the front of his robe under where he was holding the cloth. There were several adults still standing, but all had torn robes or other signs of injury. The normal teacher’s table was in two pieces behind Professor Flitwick, and appeared charred as if it had been on fire.

The mediwitch Pomphrey was kneeling next to Professor Trelawney who was one of the teachers stretched out on the floor.  After another moment the nurse stood and waived her wand to levitate the clearly unconscious professor.  “I cannot treat her here. I must be allowed to move her to the infirmary and call for specialists from Saint Mungos!”  she said urgently.

The lead Unspeakable had been talking to both Director Ragnok and Professor Snape, but again behind some sort of silencing charm as only that soft buzzing could be heard. He broke off his conversation, cancelled the silencing charm and instructed one of the other Unspeakables to go with the mediwitch and her patient. The small group swiftly moved to the exit and left the hall, presumably on their way up to the infirmary. The lead Unspeakable then looked out at the students in the rest of the hall, all of whom were pretty much staring back at him in shock.

“So there has been another issue uncovered. It is not connected to the issue with the Gringotts mail, but was a significant problem.  At the moment, the danger has been dealt with, at least as far as Hogwarts is concerned.  Please bear with us a short while longer while we arrange for additional aurors to come to the school and investigate this second issue, as well as some other concerns that have been raised, and to provide support while your injured teachers recover. Once the additional Ministry personnel have arrived, the goblins will depart back to Gringotts and you will be able to return to your common rooms and dorms. ”

By this point, most of the students were aware that Quirrell was not visible, either by direct observation or through the ever effective gossip mill passing information down the tables to those further away. The caretaker Mr. Filch and Professor McGonagall were the other two adults still on the floor.  Professor McGonagall was showing movement, while Mr. Filch was not, but Professor Sinestra was conjuring a pillow and putting it under his head, so he was probably going to be fine.  Professor Sprout was crouched down by Professor McGonagall talking to her softly as McGonagall appeared to be testing her various limbs for range of movement.

After another moment, Professor Sprout stood up, talked briefly with Professor Snape and then turned to address the students. “Alright. This has been a trying afternoon and evening, but we are moving forward. Once the additional support that has been called for arrives we will have the students move back to their common rooms by house under escort, and you are going to be required to stay in your respective dorms for the rest of the evening and night.  Prefect patrols are cancelled for this evening, and the dorm entrances will be monitored to ensure no one leaves once inside. Classes will take place as normal tomorrow, with the exception of Defense Against the Dark Arts and Divination. Professor Quirrell is no longer available to teach, and Professor Trelawney is indisposed, so until a replacement is hired for Defense, Trelawney returns or is replaced, or a work around developed for one or both classes, students will report to the Great Hall for supervised study hall during scheduled Defense and Divination class times.” She stopped speaking, and it was not clear if she was truly finished or just taking a break. It didn’t matter in any case, as in the silence a call from the middle of the Gryffindor table was heard.

“Right o, those who had before Yule break in the pool for when we would lose this year’s defense teacher, see one of us anytime starting tomorrow morning for your payout.” It was one of the Weasley twins, but Harry couldn’t identify which one.

“MISTERS WEASLEY!” Whatever injury or shock was keeping Professor McGonagall on the floor certainly hadn’t impacted her lungs at all. “That will be a week’s detention and 50 points from Gryffindor! EACH!”

A large percentage of the student body started laughing as rubies fell out of the Gryffindor hourglass on the wall and the tension that had gripped the hall to a greater or lesser degree since the goblins' arrival finally broke.

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

The next few days were odd. The students settled back into a somewhat normal routine of class and studying, but there were various Ministry personnel around the castle looking at different things and occasionally asking questions.  Not to mention other out of the ordinary occurrences. 

At lunch the day after the goblins had visited the student body was talking about a huge three-headed dog that multiple people had seen being escorted out of the school. It had had muzzles over each mouth and Hagrid walking next to it trying to keep it calm in the middle of a surrounding mass of aurors as it was taken away.  During dinner that same night it was discussed that a troll was apparently removed in a similar manner sometime during the afternoon. Two days after that there were a huge number of goblins and Unspeakables all over the school running some sort of scans everywhere they went.  The popular rumor during dinner conversation that night was they were trying to find and break the curse on the Defense position but none of the adults were talking.

The Headmaster’s traditional office continued to be off limits to all students and staff, with Professor Sprout acting as temporary headmistress and running herself ragged trying to keep up with everything.   She had even taken over an empty classroom as a temporary office, since her normal office out in Greenhouse One was considered too out of the way for the acting Headmistress. The assistant Headmistress Professor McGonagall had spent Wednesday night in the infirmary and resumed teaching on Thursday, but was clearly still feeling the effects of whatever had happened during the fight none of the students had witnessed. Most students figured she didn’t feel up to being acting Headmistress all things considered and with everything going on, but again none of the teachers were talking about it.

By the time the weekend came again Harry felt like it had been two weeks since the goblins arrived, not just two days.  Even though he was telling everyone who asked him about his interview that he couldn’t talk about it, the questions weren’t really stopping, particularly from the non Hufflepuff students.  He didn’t want to risk the secret of the room of requirement since he was frequently being followed by said students asking questions, so going there was out.  Even his fellow Hufflepuffs wouldn’t leave him completely alone about it, and in his dorm his roommate Zacharias Smith wouldn’t stop pestering him with questions anytime they were both there and awake so he was only going there to sleep. As a result, Harry had taken to spending all his free time in the Hufflepuff quiet rooms since at least there if he was pestered the prefects would eject the offender.

Harry was in the Great Hall eating breakfast Saturday morning, fairly early as he was hoping to avoid the bulk of the students.  It was earlier than the normal mail delivery, so when Hedwig landed on the table in front of him he thought she was just visiting at first.

“Hey there lovely girl. Sorry I haven’t been to visit recently; it’s been a little crazy around here.”

Hedwig barked in response at him, held out her leg and Harry saw she had a message.  He made sure no one was looking at him and opened the note. It instructed him to go to the corridor leading from the Hufflepuff rooms to the kitchens after he was finished eating, and was in Professor Snape’s handwriting. ‘Huh, that’s weird. Why a corridor?’ As with the last note the professor had sent him, this one also crumbled into dust a few minutes after he had opened it.

Xoxoxoxoxoxox

A short while later saw Harry walking down the corridor mentioned in the note, still wondering why the professor would tell him to do this. As had happened before, once he was in the section one turn away from the room with the barrel entrance to Hufflepuff, an arm reached out of a blank wall to take hold of his arm and yank him into a small room. This time though, there were two goblins standing with Professor Snape.

“Mr. Potter, these goblins are warding experts from Gringotts. We are going to take them up to the Room and let them look at the wards. You are involved because I want you to request the same room set up as you did before, with the two models of Hogwarts, and because they might need your assistance to make adjustments if they are prepared to start working immediately after their review.”

“Of course, Sir.”

“We do want to keep the knowledge of the room confidential, so this is not being done openly.  I have not heard that the invisibility cloak the portrait of Headmaster Black spoke to earlier this year has been returned to your possession.” Professor Snape paused and looked at Harry with a raised eyebrow.

“That’s right. I had forgotten about it, honestly, with everything else, but I still don’t have it. With Headmaster Dumbledore gone from the castle, I wonder if I will ever get it back now.”

“That is something the goblins can follow up on for you with the aurors and Unspeakables still investigating the Headmaster’s office and Dumbledore’s private quarters. As it is a Potter Family heirloom, it could be considered an asset of financial worth and therefore falls under their purview. Not to mention being another item in the case against Dumbledore for interfering in financial related matters when he is not your fiduciary guardian.  In the meantime, I will be placing a spell on you to conceal your presence as we move to the seventh floor and the room. It will feel rather strange.”

With no further warning, the Professor tapped his wand on the top of Harry’s head. He felt as if something slimy, like raw egg, was dropped on top of him and the feeling slithered down his body, erasing him from view as it went.

“NEAT!”

Professor Snape sneered at Harry’s reaction even as he tapped himself on the head, clearly repeating the spell on himself as he also disappeared from view. The goblins did something to cause their presence to fade as well.

Professor Snape’s voice came from the blank spot he was occupying. “We will now move to the Room. Be careful as you move through the corridors to not to brush up against any early risers.”

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

Two hours later and Harry was once again sitting in a chair watching Professor Snape talk about wards with experts at a level way beyond Harry’s understanding.  He hadn’t brought his school books with him to breakfast so he couldn’t work on homework, and the various books on warding the Room provided had also proven to be beyond Harry’s current abilities. ‘SOOO bored.’ Professor Snape, without revealing that he had access to the Founder’s portraits, did raise the concern that the wards might need to be completely taken down and rebuilt in order to completely repair the schema, so the ward experts were doing a great deal of analysis and using the models for experimentation to see if there was a way to avoid doing that.

Finally one of the goblins (Harry hadn’t caught either name) stepped away from the models and spoke directly to Harry. “I believe we have accomplished what we can at this point. We will return with a larger team the first weekend after the end of term to work on the necessary adjustments. Heir Potter, you will be staying in the castle during the holiday break, correct?”

“Yes, I will be here.”

Professor Snape spoke then. “How much time do you anticipate needing?”

“For what we will be doing, an hour. Perhaps as long as two, but that is unlikely.”

Snape nodded in acknowledgement. “We will meet here at 6AM the first Saturday of break to start the adjustments.”

To himself Harry though ‘6AM? Seriously, don’t any adults get that kids should be able to sleep in on weekends and breaks? I thought I would be able to skip the 4:30AM wake ups during break’ Aloud thought he simply said, “No problem. I’ll be here.”

“Very well. I will be disillusioning you again-“

“Professor, can I ask a question?” interrupted Harry.

“You just did,” replied Professor Snape in a snide tone.

“Sorry. But I wanted to ask about Professor Quirrell.  When everything happened that Unspeakable said he was no longer available. Did they capture the spirit that was possessing him?” Harry wasn’t sure if these goblins knew the spirit was Voldemort or not, but they had to have heard about the possession.

Professor Snape frowned at Harry. “No. The spirit abandoned Quirrell when it was obvious he was incapable of extracting himself from the situation. It was not contained by whatever ward the goblin warriors had put up and fled through the back wall. Since one of the ward notices you activated on our previous visit to this room was the one on possession, you will know if tries to return by possessing someone else. When we return here with a larger warding team at the start of break, the ward to detain possessed individuals will be one of the ones that we will be reactivating to full strength so it will not be possible for him to return after that point. Which if you had been paying any attention to the conversation the goblins and I just concluded, you would already know.”

“Oh. Sorry.”

“Quite. Now, if there is nothing further, I will disillusion you again and we will make our way back to the dungeons.”

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

The two weeks leading up to the winter break continued to be odd. At Professor Snape’s advice, given while he was taking the disillusionment off before they separated, Harry had taken out a subscription to the most popular daily paper. The professor said it was frequently slanted and to be aware it heavily favored the Ministry in its reporting when making the recommendation, but still insisted it was necessary to keep informed of what was going on.

The Daily Prophet was running stories about the happenings at Hogwarts practically every day, and there were several editorials about how Dumbledore was being unfairly persecuted and the goblins shouldn’t be allowed to bring charges in their own courts against any wicca.  The letters to the paper were also strong in support of Dumbledore. But there were also a few stories about the missing documentation on Sirius Black’s conviction, and an editorial about how horrible it would be if the reason there was no documentation was because there hadn’t been a trial (which increasingly seemed to be the case, but the Ministry was still insisting it was just a clerical error and the documentation would show up _any day now_ ).

Harry was just trying to keep from being overwhelmed by it all. The other students were finally starting to get that he wasn’t going to talk about what was going on with his mail and guardianships, so he didn’t have to spend all his time in one of the quiet rooms to find peace. He’d actually gone to the fifth year male prefect William Burnside to ask if anything could be done about Zach Smith bugging him in their actual dorm room.  The prefect had said he’d look into it, and without telling Harry had gone to the seventh year male prefect Gabriel Truman for assistance. Gabriel had entered the first year’s dorm that same evening under some sort of spell that wasn't really invisibility but made people not look at him and watched as Zach asked question after question, even in the face of Harry’s repeated responses of “I can’t talk about it, I was told not to”.  End result was that Zach had three nights of detention with Professor Sprout and a warning that if it happened again, he’d continue to get detentions until he learned to leave Harry alone. Which meant Harry could relax in his dorm again.

The library was also pretty safe, as Madam Pinch was not tolerant of any talking above a low whisper. As long as he sat at a table in line of sight of the main desk where she spent most of her time, other students wouldn’t come up to him. So he could still study with Hermione. She had questions, of course, but she at least took ‘I can’t talk about it’ as an answer. It didn’t keep her from coming up with different questions, but at least she didn’t ask the same question over and over.

All in all, Harry was feeling pretty good about things as the term ended. He was doing well in his classes, Headmaster Dumbledore was out of the castle (at least for the moment), the third floor corridor had been cleaned up and was no longer a danger, the Dark Lord’s spirit had been driven out, and there was an open inquiry as to his godfather’s status. Gerald was even pleased with his progress on his non-school studies. Things were going great. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, thank you so much for reading my story. I appreciate every kudo and comment, even if I fail to respond.


	24. Winter Break Part One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things are moving along, and Harry gets some more good news.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In case you weren't aware, I don't own Harry Potter.

There weren’t too many Hufflepuffs staying in the castle over the winter break, and Harry was the only first year male. Justin had offered to ask his parents if Harry could come home with him, but Harry declined, stating he was going to enjoy the luxury of having the dorm room all to himself for a few weeks. He certainly wasn’t going to tell his friend he had to stay to work on the wards!

So that first free day, along in his dorm since most of the students left the day before, Harry was up early to get ready to work on the wards. He had remembered to snag a few pieces of fruit from the Great Hall yesterday as breakfast wasn’t even going to have started when he had to be up on the seventh floor meeting Professor Snape and the goblin delegation. But that was for a little later. He figured as long as he was going to be up early on break, he might as well make use of the time and get up even earlier at his during the term time of 4:30AM so he could exercise. Yawning, he climbed down into his trunk to do a shortened morning workout under Gerald’s watchful eye.

“Very good, young man. Your form is holding steady now. I am still uncomfortable with you practicing with live steel while alone, but that is certainly going to be the next step. We just need to find you a live tutor, and a valid reason to explain your level of proficiency in the forms.”

“Does Professor Snape know the sword?”

“I am unsure. I will inquire. Do NOT ask him yourself directly. It would be considered rude.”

‘Another weird etiquette rule’. “Okay, I won’t. I’m going to shower and eat some fruit before heading up to the Room as it’s getting on toward that time.”

“Mind you are not followed. There are fewer students present, but fewer is not none.”

“Yes, Sir, I’ll be careful.”

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

When Harry got up to the seventh floor, he found himself confused as to why he was there and started to turn around to back downstairs.  Professor Snape appeared out of what looked like an empty corridor and stopped him before he could actually leave. “It would have been problematic to keep everyone disillusioned while we were waiting for everyone to arrive, so I placed an aversion ward to encourage anyone who comes up here to forget why they came and to go away again, and placed an illusion over the back half of the corridor to hide that there are people here and a room being accessed that is not normally present. Stand still and I will key you into the ward so you stop feeling like you need to leave.” Without further comment, the professor waved his wand over Harry’s head and spoke a short incantation. Harry immediately remembered that he was needed to access the secondary ward focus and assist the expert team Gringotts provided to make the planned changes to the wards.

As he moved through the illusion, he saw several goblins waiting. Additionally, there were two wizards as well. “Hello.”

The waiting group turned to face him. “Greetings Lord Potter,” started one of the goblins that Harry recognized from when they had reviewed the wards a few weeks ago. “If you could open the required room, it would be appreciated.”

“Of course. I will need room to pace.”

The collection of goblins moved to stand against the wall in front of the tapestry of dancing trolls, pulling the two wizards with them. The goblins seemed to understand what Harry was doing, while the two wizards watched with confused expressions on their faces as Harry walked up and down the corridor, concentrating on what he needed the room to be. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the taller red haired wizard drop his jaw in shock as the door to the Room materialized out of what had previously been a solid wall.

Harry opened the door, and gestured for the goblins, wizards, and Professor Snape to enter.

This time, Harry took the initiative once everyone was inside and the door closed. “I didn’t catch your name last time, honored goblin. While I know you are aware, to be courteous, I am Harry Potter.” Harry gave a short bow while holding his right fist against his chest as he addressed the goblin he remembered from earlier in the month. Goblins did not shake hands in their own culture, so he did not offer his to respect their customs.

“Lord Potter, I am Graphorn. Assisting me today is Nagnok, Gornuk, Ragnok, and Urg.” Each goblin gave Harry a short bow with their fists against their chests as their name was said. “Additionally, William Weasley,” Harry gave a start at hearing that name, wondering if this was the same William Weasley that was Ron’s older brother. It seemed likely, since the name was the same and he was working for Gringotts, but other than the hair he didn’t much look like his brothers. He refocused on Graphorn in time to catch at least part of the second wizard’s name. “-Wood will be assisting us today.” Harry held out his hand to William Weasley first, since he was introduced first. “Hello. Thank you for helping.”

“Are you kidding? A chance to work on Hogwarts wards is fantastic. I just don’t understand why all the secrecy.”

“As long as you mind your contract, wizard.” Said Graphorn sharply.

“Of course, Overseer.  I don’t understand why it has to be kept secret, but I understand my contractual requirements. I won’t discuss the job or Lord Potter’s role in it with anyone outside of Gringotts.”

“Very well.”

Harry turned to the second wizard. “Hello, Mr. Wood,” he said as he held out his hand again.

“Oh please, that makes me think of my father. Call me Nick.”

“Good point, Lord Potter please feel free to call me Bill,” piped up Mr. Weasley.

“And you should both please call me Harry.”

At that point a clearly impatient Professor Snape spoke up. “Lovely. Now that the niceties have been observed, can we get started? If this runs too late it won’t matter that no one here is going to talk about it as the Ministry personnel who are still investigating in the Headmaster’s office and quarters will have arrived for the day and the likelihood of getting your group back out undetected will decrease to nearly zero.”

‘Well, at least that explains why we are meeting so early,’ thought Harry as he was directed to stand at a specific point facing the secondary ward focus and the warders started casting spells.

The next hour and a half was confusing, tiring, (but not boring!) and again entirely beyond Harry’s current knowledge base and ability. But he pointed his wand where he was told to point it, spoke the incantations he was given, and did everything he was asked as the ward experts manipulated, restored and in general repaired the castle’s ward schema to be much closer to what the Founder’s had intended and originally implemented.  When they were done, the two models were nearly identical. Only the ward designed to detect and detain those affected by soul rituals was not active, as it was determined that the entire ward structure would have to come down and be replaced to reintegrate that particular ward as Rowena had feared, and that had to wait. The full wards could only be brought down safely at the primary ward focus, and that would be much too public for their purposes at this time, as it was hidden under the floor of the Great Hall. For Harry’s safety, Professor Snape wanted Harry’s connection to the castle wards kept to as few people as possible, and being involved in a ward working for over an hour in the middle of the Great Hall, no matter what time of day they picked, would NOT be able to be hidden when the school was in session.

The warders were able to add on a simple detection ward for those affected by soul rituals, but the detaining part needed to be buried much further into the main wards, and that required the wards to be brought down and reapplied from scratch. Harry didn’t really understand the why behind it, but he got that it couldn’t be done without the wards being dismantled. The current plan was to hopefully be able to redo the wards entirely sometime during the summer break, but there were a lot of things that had to happen first, including Headmaster Dumbledore being permanently barred from the castle. And he was fighting the goblins’ right to charge and bring him to trial as hard as he could, albeit by post and public sentiment only right now since there was still an active detain on sight order for him. It was apparently a huge mess, but Gerald had told him not to worry about it.

As things stood though, everyone was pretty happy with the current status of the wards, even if it was very draining.

“Whew. That was harder in some ways then dealing with tomb wards. Less likely to kill you if you get it wrong, but at least with tombs you just need to bring any old wards down, throw some anti muggle wards up, and then it’s all curse breaking on the various objects. I can’t think of the last time I’ve done so much ward work. If I’ve ever done so much ward work at one time. I don’t think I have.” Bill sagged back into one of the various chairs Harry had requested the room to provide when he set it up.

“I hear you man,” chimed in Nick.

“Yes, it was very tiring. But you can rest when you get back to your own homes. It is already 7:45 and the Ministry personnel have been arriving promptly at 8AM every morning since they effectively took over the school. I cannot be certain that the Unspeakables will not be able to tell we changed the wards, and if they do sense the differences they will start looking for the cause. All of you need to be well away from the castle before that happens. To that end, rather than have all you try to sneak down and out the main entrance, there is a less than completely secret passageway that runs out into Hogsmeade. Filch is aware of it and has it booby trapped, but the traps he is capable of setting should be no match for fully trained wizards and goblin warders.

Mr. Potter, as I have no intention of showing you where said passage is, I will disillusion you to make sure anyone up and about does not notice you as you make your way downstairs, and meet you in a short while back in the dungeons to remove the spell so you can go to breakfast and be seen. We will meet in the same room as before. As long as you remember where it is-“ Professor Snape broke off speaking to look at Harry with a raised eyebrow. Harry nodded vigorously in response. “Good. As long as you remember where it is you don’t need to be pulled inside. Simply lean against the wall for a few moments and the wall will let you through.  Everyone else will follow me; I will remain visible as no one would question my moving through the castle.  The area with the passage I am taking you to should not be trafficked at this time, and once I open the passage you all should be fine to navigate it to its end in the outskirts of Hogsmeade.”

With that, he tapped his wand on Harry’s head again to apply the spell while Bill, Nick, and the goblins also applied concealing spells to themselves and the group left the Room to go about their respective ways.

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

Harry spent the next 3 days leading up to Christmas running around the castle looking for secret passages. Now that he knew at least one existed, he figured there really should be more. There were secret rooms after all.

He tried going to the kitchens and asking one of the house elves, but they apparently had long standing instructions not to show students ways to get out of the castle and Harry’s status as an heir meant nothing. Harry tried asking if any of the passages just went between different areas of the castle, but the elf still refused to talk about any secret passages. No matter, it was fun running around leaning against random walls and thinking of exits as he paced up and down corridors.

There were some other students staying – the Weasleys were all in the castle for example – but Harry didn’t really interact with the other students much. Everyone he counted as a true friend (Susan, Hermione and Justin really) had gone home. He was the only Hufflepuff first year as it turned out all the girls had left as well so there wasn’t anyone in his year group in is House. In fact, there were only a handful of Hufflepuffs left in the castle at all, and they were all from the upper years working on research projects for various classes.  Of the other first years that stayed, there were a few Ravenclaws and Ron Weasley, and he wasn’t really close to any of them.

Harry also spent some time up the Room of Requirement, playing around with what it could do. He was worried that one of the Ministry workers still coming and going from the castle might catch him at it, but during a quick trip to talk to Rowena’s portrait about it he found out that while the elves wouldn’t show students any of the secret passages, he could ask that they keep an eye on the corridor outside the room and warn him if anyone else was around. Apparently wiccan concealing magic didn’t really work on house elves, so even if someone was under that disillusionment spell or whatever the seventh year had used in the dorm, the elves would be able to tell.

It was at lunch on Christmas Eve that the next piece of good news hit.

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxo

“Mr. Potter?” Harry turned his head around to see one of the aurors that had been investigating up in the Headmaster’s office and rooms standing behind him.

“Yes?”

“When you are finished your meal, please come up to our temporary office down the corridor from the Headmaster’s office. We have recovered some personal property that belongs to you as the last Potter and we need you to complete some parchment work to take possession.”

“Oh, okay.”

The auror nodded to him at his acknowledgement, and walked away. ‘Personal property. I hope it’s my cloak. It would be brilliant to have an invisibility cloak.’ He shook his head. ‘I’ll know soon, I guess, no use wondering about it until then.’ Harry returned to his meal only to feel someone staring at him. He looked up and Professor Snape was glaring at him. ‘Well, I’ll take a guess and think that he thinks I’m going to get the invisibility cloak, and isn’t happy about it.’

Harry took a few more minutes to finish eating properly. He wanted to race up the office and see what the aurors had found, but he was finally finished with the various potions and whatnot the goblin healers had proscribed and he was enjoying living life without pain from weak bones and muscles so he wasn’t going to start messing up his dietary requirements again. And shorting meals or eating unbalanced meals would count. But shortly he was on his way upstairs and in front of the room the Ministry personnel had taken over for the duration of their time in the castle. He gave a quick but firm knock on the door.

“Please enter,” he heard, so he did.

“Ah yes, Mr. Potter. Please take a seat. Headmaster Dumbledore was certainly invested in your life, even if he never actually introduced himself to you as your legal guardian. He had numerous items belonging to the Potter family, and none of us could think of justifiable reasons for any of it to be in his hands and not yours, his status as your guardian notwithstanding.

Now some of these items are not suitable for a child of your age, so after you sign the acknowledgment of their return we will be arranging for the goblins to place them in your family vault where you will have access to them once you reach your majority.  Any items that you are allowed to take immediate possession of but do not wish to keep at school the goblins have agreed to also remove but place in your trust vault so you can access them at will.  I have prepared a list, separated into the items that will be returned to your family vault first, and then the items that you may keep with you if you wish, so if you would take this quill and initial by each item as we go through them.” And with that statement, the Unspeakable sitting behind the desk pulled out a scroll of parchment. He unrolled the top part in front of Harry, leaving what must have been another three feet worth rolled up and waiting to be gone through. Harry looked down and saw that there appeared to be one item listed on each line, but the writing was not very large at all. ‘Wow, that is a LOT of stuff, if the entire scroll is nothing but the list.’

“First and foremost, the goblins specifically tasked us to locate the Potter family heirloom invisibility cloak. The portrait of former Headmaster Phineas Black also confirmed that Headmaster Dumbledore had possession of the cloak in the castle earlier this year, so we made a concerted effort to make sure we found it. Headmaster Dumbledore had it concealed quite well, but it is an unusual artifact and an ancestor of yours that worked with the Unspeakables had left a record of the cloak’s unique thermagical signature. What is so interesting about your cloak is when it is actively being used – worn by a person – it is truly undetectable. But when it is not interacting with a magical being’s magical aura it has an affect on the field of magic that exists all around us. It actually BENDS the field – acts like a sink absorbing ambient magic – so it can be located by looking for a place the field is affected in such a way.  But that bending of the magic field goes away when it is being worn as it somehow interacts with the aura of the person wearing it to blend in seamlessly with the field.  It is absolutely unique as a magical artifact!” The Unspeakable by this time was actually bouncing in the chair and waiving his hands around in his excitement. Harry was just nodding along wide eyed.

“But that turned out to be key, as the way we found Headmaster Dumbledore’s stash was in a scan specifically looking for the cloak’s effect! And once we found the cloak and were able to break the protections on where he was storing it, we found so much more. He had items belonging not just to you, but to others and—“ The Unspeakable broke off and visibly composed himself again.

“That isn’t really your concern though. The important thing is that we did locate your cloak, along with numerous other items belonging to the Potter family, and we are returning them to your control at this time. So let’s get started. As you see the cloak is listed first in the section of items that will be returned to your family vault, and here it is for your inspection.” The Unspeakable turned to a chest sitting on a low table next to him on the right and brought out a swath of silvery cloth.

“Why is the cloak going to be returned to the family vault? Why can’t I keep it?”

Even through the hood obscuring his facial features, Harry could feel the glare. “No eleven year old needs access to an invisibility cloak. No school student at all needs access to an invisibility cloak. It’s absurd to even consider the thought. This will be returned to your family vault for safe keeping until you are an adult. Now, please initial to indicate receipt.” And with that final statement, he placed the cloak in a similar chest sitting on a low table on the left.

“Next,” he continued, and Harry frowned, but placed his initials next to the first line item.

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

An hour later Harry was convinced that his family had the oddest taste in book collecting EVER.  Topics were all over the place. There were books on blood magic that the Unspeakable said had been banned from sale for decades or even centuries, but as these copies were clearly antique (and frequently first editions) they were considered valuable assets and protected from confiscation. But when the list had gotten to the section of items that Harry could keep if he wanted there were also children’s books with titles like _The Toadstool Tales_ and even muggle fiction! The Unspeakable had no idea why Dumbledore had so many books that rightfully belonged to Harry, but as each and every one of them had a bookplate that identified it as part of the Potter library, there was no question of proper ownership.  Most of the books on magic went into the smallish box on the desk for things that Harry wanted to take, but the ones like the ones on blood magic went into the chest destined for his family vaults. The muggle books Harry asked to be placed in his trust vault as he didn’t really have time to read for fun this year, but hoped that might change if things settled down and he might want to read them before he was 17.

Of much greater interest to Harry (though also among the items going to be stored in his family vault) were his parent’s wands. Harry had stopped the Unspeakable for a bit at that point.

_Minor Flashback_

“Look, I get that I can’t have multiple wands and these need to be stored away. I get that, I do. But, can’t I just hold each one for a bit? Just for a few moments?” He looked with his best ‘puppy-eyed’ look at the Unspeakable across the desk.

“I suppose that wouldn’t hurt anything. Here is your father’s wand. I don’t know what the core is, but the wood is clearly mahogany.” Harry took the wand reverently from the Unspeakable. His father had once used this wand! Harry tentatively gave it a wave, remembering the sometimes destructive effects when he was trying to find his own holly and unicorn hair wand, but other than a few faint sparks, nothing happened.

“Don’t feel bad, Mr. Potter. It is rare for children to be able to use their parents’ wands. Sometimes an heirloom wand will work for a child so families do tend to keep them, but usually there are at least two or more generations between those that wands will choose. Now, give that one back and I will let you hold your mother’s wand for a moment. Her wand wood is willow, but again, I am unaware of what the core is.”

Harry did as he was asked, returning his father’s wand across the desk to be placed in the chest destined for Gringotts, and accepting his mother’s wand in return. “WOW!” As Harry took his mother’s wand, he felt a rush of magic even stronger than he remembered from the first time he had picked up his own wand, and a veritable fountain of bright multi-colored sparks spit out of the top of the wand before he even had a chance to wave it.

“Well, that shows me doesn’t it? That is clearly a very compatible wand for you, Mr. Potter, and means you will have a back-up accessible should anything ever happen to your primary wand. But compatible as it is, it still needs to be stored away for now.”

Harry was very reluctant to give his mother’s wand back. He had felt an instant connection, and that it was his mother’s wand only made it better. ‘Maybe I can ask the goblins if another exception could be made. They let me take my dad’s trunk from one of the main vaults. Maybe they’ll let me take my mum’s wand as well.’ With that thought, Harry had finally passed the willow wand back over to the waiting Unspeakable and let him place it in the chest next to his father’s wand.

_End Minor Flashback_

Finally after close to two hours they had finished going through all the items that Dumbledore had had that the aurors and Unspeakables identified as belonging to Harry. Harry had a new appreciation for things magic could do. There was a pensieve – a device that apparently let a wiccan place a memory in the bowl portion for review from a different perspective, or for review by someone else other than the person who was the source of the memory. There was a set of training Quiddich balls that could have different speeds set for the snitch and the bludgers so players could practice moves without going at full speed. There was a stuffed teddy bear that had a charm for pleasant dreams worked into it so if it was placed in a child’s crib the child would sleep better. Several pieces of jewelry. There was just so MUCH.

“Well, now that that’s done, if you would just sign off on the bottom of the scroll, you can take this box here,” the Unspeakable said. “This box will be given to the goblins to place in your trust vault,” he said as he patted the box of items Harry could have, but didn’t want to keep at school. Not because he lacked the room – his trunk still had plenty of space of course – but Harry figured that he needed to pretend he didn’t have room for everything he could keep or his secret trunk wouldn’t stay so secret. “And this chest will be placed in your family vault and you will be able to go through it more thoroughly once you reach majority. That is everything I had to review with you today. Do you have any further questions about the process?”

“Why was there such… I dunno… random stuff?” asked Harry.

“We cannot be sure without talking to Mr. Dumbledore, and he is proving to be very elusive at the moment, but once we realized how much was present a member of my department went to the memorial in Godric’s Hollow. It appears that at some before the Ministry finished setting up the memorial and sealing the premises, Mr. Dumbledore went through the property and removed these items. We have no idea why he took such an odd mix of items, but one theory that fits is that he may have been in a rush and simply took item by category such as all books, all magical items etc.”

“Um, I’m sorry. I don’t know what you are talking about. What memorial? And property?” asked Harry, somewhat confused.

“Has no one ever…? Well. Something else to add to the list of failings. Mr. Potter, at the time of You-Know-Who’s defeat, you and your parents were in hiding in a small cottage property in the mixed wicca/muggle village of Godric’s Hollow. After that Halloween, the Ministry declared the cottage to be a memorial site, to be preserved in its ruined state as a monument to your parents and their sacrifice. There is also a statue in the town square. But as for the cottage, when it was declared a memorial site, a preservation spell was cast over the entire property and a ward established to keep people out. You will be able to enter as you are the legal property owner of course, but all others can only come up to the property line. Muggles can’t see the house at all any longer, and wicca are stopped at the gate where there is a sign that recaps the events that cost you your parents. Wicca are always visiting and leaving small gifts of flowers and such in thanks. Many of them also tend to leave flowers at your parents’ gravesite as well, which is in the town cemetery.”

“I…I…I…” Harry fought not to cry. “I didn’t know. No one told me. There’s a memorial, and graves? My aunt always said they were drunks who died in a car crash. I mean, I know that’s wrong now, found out when Hagrid brought me my Hogwarts letter, but I didn’t think about what that meant. I didn’t …” Harry broke off, overwhelmed.

The Unspeakable shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “Perhaps once this situation with Mr. Dumbledore is resolved someone can make sure to take you to visit your parents’ graves.”

“I’d like that.” Harry sniffed a bit as he composed himself; he had something else now to follow up with the goblins. They hadn’t talked about property when they were talking about what he inherited, but since it wasn’t in the bank maybe they hadn’t thought about it or been aware of it.

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxo

Christmas morning was yet another revelation. Harry woke up a bit later than normal, having deliberately not set a wand alarm because hey, Christmas. But after months of getting up between 4:30 and 6 (depending on whether or not he was exercising that morning) he was still up well before 7AM. He didn’t rush moving about, enjoying the luxury of not having anywhere to be, and was shocked when he finally opened the curtains around his bed to see a small pile of what were obviously gifts sitting at the base of his bed.

Harry scrambled off his bed and sat on the floor next to the pile. ‘Presents! I’ve never gotten presents before. Well, other than Hedwig. But never Christmas presents!’

He sorted through the pile before he started opening packages. He had something from Justin, Hermione, and Professor Sprout!  There was also a card not attached to any package. ‘I need to figure out how to buy them presents back. I didn’t even think of buying anyone any gifts.’ Harry thought to himself as he started opening the packages.

Professor Sprout had given him a chocolate frog. Harry thought it was probably something she did for all her students, or at least for all students that stayed in the castle over the break. It certainly wasn’t anything personal.

Justin had gotten him a cookbook aimed at healthy choices called _Cooking Light._ It seemed an odd choice for a gift from an eleven year old boy, but Justin was probably poking a little fun at Harry’s consistently healthy diet. Plus Harry had opened up a bit more about his home life with the Dursleys and mentioned that cooking was the one chore he was given that he had actually enjoyed.

Hermione had also gotten him a book of sorts. Her present was a color coded homework planner, with notes about the holiday assignments already filled in. Harry laughed when he opened it and saw the comments and dates in her careful handwriting.

The card was from Director Ragnok and stated that he (the director) hoped Harry had had a pleasant Yule, and informing Harry that his healer had approved Harry to not follow his meal plan for this one day, as long as he still ate three meals spaced out throughout the day and made sure he included some sort of protein at each one. He wasn’t allowed to just eat sweets all day with nothing else. And he wasn’t allowed to only eat at the Feast. But the other rules could be forgotten until tomorrow since Harry had been so good all term.

It was certainly more than he had expected.  Harry put his new books away in the regular compartment of his trunk and then opened the largest room and climbed down to talk to Gerald. He needed to see if it was possible to order gifts remotely and have the costs billed to his account.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you again for all the comments and kudos. It is amazing to me how many people are enjoying what I am writing.


	25. Winter Break Part Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry's 'break' gets somewhat less like a break and back to more like work.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't own, don't sue. 
> 
> Still blown away by how many kudos, comments, subscriptions, and bookmarks this story has.

The period between Christmas and New Year’s was pretty quiet for most residents of Hogwarts. The Ministry personnel were taking a break (leaving the Headmaster’s office and personal quarters sealed).  Harry wondered why Professor Snape just hadn’t waited to work on the wards until now, but wasn’t going to ask. The few students left in the castle were all in a food coma the day after Christmas, and didn’t really seem motivated to get more active even after they had digested the massive amount of food consumed.

Harry took advantage of the quiet and spent some time back in the secret room behind the kitchens talking to the Founders about the history of the school, and learning more about Tom Riddle, the self-styled Lord Voldemort.  The founders in general and Salazar in particular were also very interested in hearing about Harry’s life prior to coming to Hogwarts, and how Harry had come to sign the treaty with the goblins when it hadn’t been done in centuries.  So December 28th found Harry sitting in front of the large combined portrait talking about his history and what he had gone through before coming to Hogwarts.

During the conversation Harry mentioned the soul leech that the goblin healers had removed from his head. His week abruptly became rather less quiet.

“A soul leech! How the name of the Morrigan did you manage to have a soul leech attach to you?” shouted Salazar after Harry had gotten to that part of his story. “I mean, I knew the idiot had created a horcrux; he did it while he was still a student and came back to hide the damn thing in the school later on. You should actually be getting pings about its presence now that you’ve restored the bulk of the ward schema, by the by. You’ll need to deal with that at some point soon. But while his having a horcrux explains why his spirit was able to remain on this plane of existence after his body was destroyed, it doesn’t explain his soul splitting when he lost his body so a piece of it could end up in you.”

“What if he had more than one?” asked Merlin.

“What do you mean, more than one. More than one what?” asked Rowena.

“More than one horcrux. If he split his soul more than once, it could have been damaged to the extent that when his body was destroyed it split again, leaving a fragment to attach itself to Harry.”

The Founders all turned and stared at Merlin in obvious horror.

“Um, I’m sorry, what’s a horcrux?” asked Harry.

“Oh, a horcrux is an abomination of magic. When a person deliberately commits murder – this is not killing in self-defense or defense of others mind you, but murder, killing for gain or pleasure or other unjust reason – it damages the soul.  Killing anyone will damage the soul, really, but deliberate murder damages it the worst, actually causing cracks of a sort.  That’s not really a good analogy as the soul is not truly a physical object but a metaphysical construct-”

“Sal! Focus!” interrupted Rowena sharply. “You are always on me about not going off on tangents, take your own advice.”

Salazar cleared his throat and continued. “At any rate, there is a foul ritual of black magic that allows amoral idiotic bastards like my unlamented descendant to increase the damage done in such a way that the soul will split into two pieces. The ritual then allows one of the pieces of soul to be extracted out of the being it belongs in and bound to a physical object. One usually then protected and well hidden for safety. The idea being that as long as part of a soul is tied to this plane of existence, it will prevent any of the soul from leaving this plane. So if the imbecile who did this dies, the rest of the soul hangs around as a bodiless wraith until the horcrux is destroyed and the wraith exorcised, or the horcrux is used in another foul ritual to bind the wraith back into a new physical form.

In the meantime, the wraith can possess other entities, human or animal. It will corrupt whatever it possesses, leading to a slow death for the one possessed. While not actively possessing something it will poison the land and water around it. The wraith is something outside the natural order of things – an abomination as much as the horcrux object is – and it needs to be destroyed. That one of my descendants would have stooped so low.” Salazar trailed off, shaking his head.

“Okay, so Lord Vold-“

“Oh call him by his actual name, Tom Riddle,” interrupted Helga. “That made up French sounding name is ridiculous.”

“Okay, so Tom Riddle did this, created a horcrux years ago, and hid it in the school. If the wards detect them, why didn’t the headmaster know? If you know about it, it had to be reported.”

Rowena turned and looked at Harry. “Well, we learned about it from the elves.  Remember, we don’t get the ward notifications directly as portraits; the elves pass on the information as they are still tied to the wards. I’m not sure if they got the notice from the wards or some other way; elves have their own magic and own methods of detection. But they wouldn’t have talked to the Headmaster about it without being asked.

Actually, I have no idea why Headmaster Dippet didn’t realize it when it was created. I don’t think the ward notifications had been degraded that far at that point. But by the time Riddle returned to the school and hid his horcrux, Dumbledore was headmaster and had already started disconnecting and deactivating the ward alerts so he probably didn’t get a notice.”

Helga spoke up again at that point. “Wait Ro, you’re right in that the wards hadn’t been fiddled with when Riddle killed that girl and used the death to fuel the ritual, but didn’t Dumbledore already have some of the alerts reporting to him instead of Dippet? I remember Tristan telling us that, and saying how disapproving the portraits of the former headmasters were about it. I can’t see Dippit ignoring a warning that severe, he was somewhat less than all there as he got older but he had a good heart. But I can certainly see that BLO—“ She broke off speaking for a moment to compose herself. “Well, I can certain see Dumbledore deciding to ignore it for some reason. Probably thinking he could use the information for blackmail or something.”

“Perhaps it goes beyond that,” said Rowena in a thoughtful tone.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, why would Dumbledore ask Headmaster Dippet for control of some of the wards to begin with? Now that we are talking about it, I remember Tristan ranting about how Dumbledore was going on about making sure he could handle the extra information coming at him – which I’m guessing he decided he couldn’t since he turned most of it off as soon as he could. But Dumbledore was pretty much guaranteed to be the next Headmaster after he defeated Grindelwald, and that’s when he asked Dippet to share the wards[1].  But it always seemed odd to me that he would even be worried about such a thing. Dumbledore was always so proud of his intelligence, and of his magical power. He obviously thought he was better than Dippet, so there wasn’t any reason for him to think he wouldn’t be able to handle the extra information, as after all Dippet could handle it. Actually, now that I am thinking about it more, I think he turned off the notifications because he didn’t want to deal with them, or didn’t care about the notices, or didn’t think he needed them.”

“So?”

“So all that happened the summer before Riddle got a hold of that book that talked about Horcruxs. How did Riddle get the book?  I mean, I know he found it in the Restricted Section, but I certainly can’t see any reasonable Headmaster or Librarian including it a school library, even in the Restricted Section. Maybe Dumbledore arranged for him to see it.”

“Ro, that’s…that’s a really disturbing thought,” said Godric.

“I agree it’s disturbing. But think about it. Dumbledore is controlling, apparently steals from orphans, which Riddle was, and not above trying to manipulate people for the quote greater good end quote. Tom had told Dumbledore that he could speak Parseltongue early on, before he got really suspicious and stopped sharing information. Dumbledore must have thought Riddle really was the Slytherin Heir, not knowing there are additional requirements. He didn’t talk to Riddle about doing an inheritance test at Gringotts, probably so Riddle couldn’t access any potential assets there, but he could have thought that if set up Riddle as another dark lord and defeated him in combat that he could lay claim to Slytherin’s assets as per the right of conquest. So I really think it is not outside the realm of possibility that Dumbledore arranged for that book to be in the library and for Riddle to find it. The muggle side of the war didn’t end until November, well after the term started, so even with the news of Grindelwald’s defeat Riddle might still have been panicked about going back to the orphanage in muggle London at the end of the year since the bombing hadn’t stopped yet when he left for Hogwarts that September. And then when Myrtle was killed and he had that murder splinter his soul-“

“After corrupting my poor Sylvia!”

“Yes, Sal, we again are all well aware of how you feel about Tom Riddle and the things he did. He tarnished your good name. He corrupted your basilisk. And really, Sal, a basilisk? In a school? And hidden from the wards? What were you thinking?” Helga cut off Salazar before he could get lost in his ranting again.

“She was intended to be an emergency defense if needed. To defend the students, not attack them. She was supposed to be left sleeping in hibernation! Not woken up and used as a weapon!” Sal was clearly defensive.

“Um, I’m sorry to interrupt again. But, what’s a basilisk?” Harry had been learning quite a bit listening to the arguments back and forth, but having something that could kill students in the school didn’t sound good. “And how could something be hidden from the wards? I thought they were supposed to cover everything?”

Salazar looked a little shifty eyed at that question. “Yes, well. It’s not so much that the basilisk, which is a special type of magical serpent, is hidden from the wards as that the place she hibernates is not covered by the ward schema.”

“Because you didn’t tell the rest of us that you had built your so called chamber of secrets until after we were all dead and couldn’t make the changes to include it inside the wards!” Rowena shouted. She had clearly not lost any of her anger about that no matter that it had been a thousand years.

“Rowena, enough,” said Godric firmly. “That is what it is, and yelling about it won’t change it. Perhaps when Harry and the goblins strip out the wards entirely and reapply them over the summer it will be possible to include Sal’s chamber in the new schema. For now though, we need to think about what Merlin said. If Tom Riddle really did create multiple horcruxes, that’s a huge issue. We had been thinking that we could have Harry retrieve the one left in the Room of Lost Things, destroy it with the goblins’ assistance and be ready to exorcise Riddle’s wraith. But we can’t exorcise the wraith if there are other horcruxes out there.”

The group in the portrait fell silent as they thought that through, and Harry just shook his head. ‘This heir of Slytherin thing is getting to be really a lot of work.’

Another hour of brainstorming later and Harry was instructed to leave, go to his trunk and have Gerald deliver a message to the goblins summarizing their suspicions and asking that they also pass them on to Professor Snape.  He was also given permission to tell the goblins he had limited access to a portrait of Salazar Slytherin, but was not allowed to talk about the other founders or Merlin.

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

“I’m sorry, Harry. I need a moment.” Gerald sat back in his frame and just stared out blindly into Harry’s training room. Harry had just finished telling him about meeting a portrait of Salazar Slytherin, being told that Tom Riddle had created at least one but probably more horcruxes, and that they needed to pass the information onto Professor Snape as early as possible.

After a long moment of rather uncomfortable silence, the portrait spoke again. “You are certain that Slytherin said he suspected more than one horcrux has been made.”

“Yeah, he’s pretty sure it’s why Riddle’s soul was so unstable it that a piece could come loose and get attached to me on that night.  If there was only one horcrux, the rest of his soul should have been in too good a shape for something like that to happen. But if he had more than one, then the damage would have been enough that when the killing curse bounced and destroyed his body, a piece could have come off the wraith and attach to the only other living thing left in the area, me.”

“I can’t think of anything I’ve ever heard that would be more disturbing. Yes, this is critical information. I will take it to the goblins immediately and have them send a priority missive to Professor Snape.”

“Thank you.”

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

The next day Harry decided he wasn’t up to talking to the Founders again, and didn’t really feel like studying. He didn’t want to stay in the trunk either. The common room was too quiet with most of the students gone, and after taking one look at the free for all snowball fight going on out on the lawn, he wasn’t going to go outside. Those Weasley twins were NUTS!

Harry made his way up to the seventh floor. Reaching the corridor with the tapestry of dancing trolls, he started to pace back and forth. ‘I need a room to learn how to fight against a moving opponent.’

The door that appeared was a dark wood, with an odd long bar running perpendicular to the floor in the middle for a handle. Harry grasped the bar and pulled open the door. As he entered into a large, apparently sunlit room paneled in a light colored wood with various weapons hanging on the walls, he heard a voice bark “Take off your shoes! You don’t wear shoes in the dojo!” Harry jumped, and turned toward the voice.

Walking toward him was an older man wearing a white jumpsuit of some sort with a black belt tied around his waist. He was barefoot, and carrying a staff. “I am Master Jin. I will train you to fight, so you may survive your enemy.”

“Wow.”

Two hours later, Harry was more ‘Ow’ than ‘Wow’. Having an instructor who could hit you while demonstrating a move was very different than simply practicing the movements on your own. Sharptooth hadn’t hit so hard when Harry had started his training. Of course Harry was still healing when he had been training with Sharptooth, and just learning. Master Jin felt Harry was far enough along that he should be better at blocking. And was determined to have Harry get better as soon as possible.

“Adequate, I suppose. You will return every other day for training, without fail.” Harry was instructed as he changed back to his normal clothes out of the white gi and belt the room had provided. ‘Oh joy, yet another set of lessons. I really need to find a way to get out of some of this stuff,’ thought Harry. His teacher continued, “Next time you will have an orange belt. You have enough skill from your prior training to skip white and yellow.”

“I don’t understand, Sensei.” The teacher had been very specific on how he was to be addressed by Harry. And while he had introduced himself as Master, Harry was not to use that term. Sensei, meaning teacher, was the proper form of address from a student.

“The color of the belt indicates how far you have advanced in your training. When you have earned a black belt, you will know you have achieved competence at the style I am teaching you and can choose to either further refine and improve or request a different teacher and start a new style. I started you at white for beginner while I tested where you were in technique. You were not taught my style before, but easily adapted what you had been taught to the style I employ. Thus you have earned a jump in levels.”

“Oh. What is the difference between this style and the other?”

“There are many different styles. I am teaching you karate, with elements of bojutsu. Karate is a martial art centered on fighting without weapons using your hands and feet to strike opponents, while bojutsu is centered around using a staff. Other styles concentrate on different elements. Judo for example concentrates on holds and throws as a combat style. So if you use karate in a fight you might kick an enemy, or strike at their throat with the side of your hand, while if you use judo you might grab onto the arm of your enemy and use it as leverage to throw your opponent onto the ground where you can get a choke hold on their throat. They are both useful, but sometimes people find one or another easier to use.”

“So how did I get you for my teacher?”

“You came to my dojo.”

“But why did I get your dojo, and not a judo dojo?”

His sensei looked confused. “You got my dojo, because you entered my dojo. If you wanted a judo dojo, you should have gone to a judo dojo. Based on your comments that an enemy is seeking to kill you, I thought you choose karate because it is one of the most combat oriented arts. Judo is more of a sport at this point, though it can be used in a fight.  It is similar to aikido, which also concentrates on taking your opponent’s attack and turning it away. But Aikido is even less useful in a true fight as it is designed for defense without causing harm to the one attacking you, which again, I believe would not be what you were looking for.”

‘Comments? I don’t remember talking about why I need to know how to fight. He’s talking about something that must have been part of the room set up. I don’t think he knows he’s not real! Wow. I’ll have to ask Lady Ravenclaw about that.’ The founders had all given Harry permission to use their given names, but Harry wasn’t really comfortable with that. ‘I wonder if he’ll really know if I come every other day or not?’ Harry decided he’d think about it later, as he wanted to go down to dinner.

“Thank you for your time today, Sensei. I appreciate all the training you are giving me.” Harry gave a bow to the teacher.

“You are welcome, deshi,” replied Master Jin as he bowed back. “Remember, every other day. You must be consistent to train your muscles.”

“Yes, sensei. I understand.”

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxox

As Harry entered the Great Hall for dinner, he was careful to move smoothly and evenly, albeit a little slower than normal. He didn’t want to raise any awkward questions about why he was sore. Unfortunately, he saw Professor Snape taking a long look before frowning, and didn’t think he was fooled.  Worse, since he was running a bit late, the only space left was directly next to Professor Snape, who was sitting at one end of the table as normal. The other teachers and students staying at the castle over the break had already filled in the other spaces. Harry made his way up the hall and sat down. “Sorry I’m late, I lost track of time.”

“No worries, Mr. Potter,” replied his Head of House from further down the table in a cheerful voice. “It’s your holiday. Just go ahead and dig in, no reason to stand on ceremony.”

Harry immediately put the word to deed and started filling his plate. After he had sat down, a few more dishes had appeared on the table in front of where he was sitting. There was a plate of grilled fish, Harry didn’t know what type, some bright green beans in a bowl, without any sauce or butter, and a bowl of what Harry recognized as seasoned couscous. They joined the dishes already there, which were a beef roast of some type, sliced on a plate with a cream sauce ladled over it, brussel sprouts that appeared to have been boiled to nearly mush and covered in melted butter, and mashed potatoes, again with melted butter clearly visible against the white of the potatoes. Harry was careful to fill his plate from the new choices that had appeared. Professor Snape looked at the new options, and also took some of the new choices onto his plate that had just had a small portion of the beef and potatoes. 

“Does this normally happen when you come to the hall for dinner, Mr. Potter?” Professor Snape asked Harry quietly.

“Um, I guess so? At least since a little after Halloween when I asked the house elves if it would be possible to get some healthier choices.” Harry replied just as quietly.

“I wasn’t aware they took requests like that for meals in the great hall, though I have had experience with them taking requests when I’ve eaten on my own. I will have to see if they will make the same options available at the staff table going forward.”

“I don’t see why not. They started giving the Gryffindor table down by their first years the same stuff they give me after Hermione mentioned she wished they would when she saw what I was eating. Her parents are dentists and fanatical about sugar and stuff.”

“Good to know,” with that comment, the professor gave his attention to his meal. Harry also concentrated on eating, with occasionally contributing to the conversation the other students were having a little way down the table. It was mostly about the snowball fight, which he hadn’t been in, and debating the merits of various Quiddich teams, which Harry wasn’t familiar with, so he stayed pretty quiet.

After bit when he was finished eating, Snape looked around at the rest of the table to make sure no one was paying attention to them. He turned slightly toward Harry and spoke in a quiet voice. “You will meet me, you should know where, after dinner as we need to discuss the latest. You will also explain where you were and what you were doing this afternoon that left you in such a state. I thought you might have overdone it in the snowball fight, but since you didn’t participate that is clearly not the case.” Without waiting for Harry to reply, he rose from the table and swept away with his habitual billowing of robes.

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxox

Harry leaned against the corridor wall and slipped through into the small room he and Professor Snape had been using for meetings. Once he was through and turned around, he found the professor sitting in an armchair in front of a small table with another armchair on the other side. Harry walked over to take the second chair.

“I received your message regarding horcruxes from the goblins. The information that there might be multiple items is… troubling.”

“Yes sir.”

“The message stated there was one of these objects in the school. You haven’t tried to retrieve it yourself, have you?”

“No sir.”

“Do you know where it is?”

“Apparently it’s in one of the aspects of the Room of Requirement. If someone wants to hide something, and walks up and down the hall thinking about a place to hide stuff, then they get a sort of lost and found room. It’s also where the elves store actual lost stuff that students leave behind. I haven’t tried asking for that version of the room on my own; the founders said there is some pretty dangerous stuff there, not even thinking of the horcrux.”

“A student with a shred of common sense. How refreshingly rare. But also clearly, based on your gingerly way of moving this evening, fleeting in nature. Before we get further into discussing the horcurx issue, pray tell me, Mr. Potter, exactly why are you moving as if you were Mr. Dumbledore’s age?” Professor Snape leaned back and looked at Harry with a raised eyebrow as he finished speaking.

Harry hunkered down in his chair and looked intently at his hands clasped together on the table.

“I’m waiting.”

“I need to get better at fighting.”

“No, Mr. Potter, you don’t. You are a child. You should be concentrating on your school work. Let the adults do the fighting.”

“No, it’s not that. Or not exactly that. I’m taking lessons. The goblins set it up at first, and started my training when I was with them over the summer. I’m required to know how to fight because I might need to take the battlefield with them or something. It’s from the treaty I signed. I mean I’m not expected to fight right now, but Sharptooth, he’s the goblin that started my combat training, Sharptooth said I was actually starting late and I had to make sure I trained because waiting until I was grown didn’t let the muscles really develop properly and they made sure they picked a portrait that could watch me and give feedback and-“

“Enough!” Snape cut off Harry’s ramblings about his training to fight. “I understand. What changed today? From your semi coherent statements you have been training since the summer. Today is the first time you looked like you were injured from your training.”

“I’m not hurt! I’m just … a little tired and bruised.”

“And how did you get bruised?”

“Well, I’m learning blocks.”

“Learning blocks. You mean learning how to block an attack?”

“Yeah, that. I’m training with a staff, and learning how to block an opponent’s staff.  I’m not really good at it yet.”

“Not good at blocking a staff. I know you have a wizard portrait instructing you in your extracurricular studies such as the mediation exercises you are supposed to be doing, as well as this combat training, and you seemed to confirm that in your rambling just now. I will be testing you on your progress with your mediations before the end of the winter break, by the way, so I hope you have been diligent. But back to your physical rather than mental training. How does having a portrait training you translate into somehow being beaten with a staff because you can’t block properly?”

Harry winced at the blunt description. “I’m not that bad. I can move the staff and block some hits. I just need to get better at my form. I got hit because my form is sloppy and I still don’t have a lot of upper body strength yet. My form will improve and I’ll build the muscles to be able to block strikes as I practice.”

“That still doesn’t explain exactly who you are allowing to strike at you with a weapon. A weapon that can kill in trained hands. And lest you have forgotten, there are two very powerful wizards who would gain from your untimely demise.”

“But it wasn’t anyone connected with either of them. The Room gave me someone to train with.”

“You were training in the Room of Requirement against a body that the Room gave you. Of all the dunderheaded-“

Harry winced again as Professor Snape continued ranting at him on his poor decision making skills. This was not going to be a pleasant way to spend his evening. Finally after about 20 minutes, the professor wound down. Harry was reluctantly impressed. As far as he could tell (and part of that was guessing because he didn’t know all the words that were used) Professor Snape had called him some type of idiot at least in every other sentence, but the professor hadn’t used the same word or phrase more than once the entire time. He still felt thoroughly told off mind you, but impressed nonetheless.

Professor Snape sat breathing deeply after he finally ran out of things to say. “I know better than to expect you to not return for more of this training. When are you next planning to go?”

“Um, Sensei said to come every other day, so I was going to go the morning of New Year’s Eve.”

“And this is in the Room of Requirement, correct?”

“Yes sir.

Professor Snape nodded decisively. “Very well. I will come with you and observe this training to ensure it is safe for you to continue, and then you will wait in the corridor while I search the Room for the horcrux. It is possible that the Dark Lord placed protections on whatever item he used that required Parseltongue to get through, so I might need you, but if the Room contains other dangerous items I don’t want you inside poking around while I locate what we need.”

Harry’s eyes widened. He hadn’t told anyone outside the goblins and the Founders that he could speak to snakes. Professor Snape actually snorted at whatever expression was showing on Harry’s face. “No, no one told me. You are the acknowledged Slytherin heir. You have to be a parselmouth. It would be obvious to anyone who knows you are the heir.”

Harry gulped. “The goblins said wizards don’t much like snake speakers. They said it would be bad if it got out that I can speak to snakes.”

Professor Snape sighed. “Well they are not wrong as far as to what the reaction here would be. The Dark Lord speaks Parseltongue and has made a point of casting the most horrible dark magic he can using it. As a result in this country and much of Europe the ability has become associated with the Dark Arts and megalomania as a result. However, in other areas of the world it is a respected, even revered ability. Mayan wizards to this day actively seek parselmouths to train as many of their oldest rituals require a speaker. Natives in North American require their shamans to be parselmouths, and the highest regarded Healers in India are all parselmouths.  There is a reason the rod of Asclepius has a snake twined around it after all.”

Harry blinked in confusion. “The rod of what?”

“The rod of Asclepius is an ancient symbol from Greek mythology associated with the demigod Asclepius who was known for immense skill and knowledge of healing. He supposedly obtained his healing skills by listening to snakes that shed their skins only to emerge bigger and healthier than before. So you can understand that the current British view of parselmouths is hardly the majority view of the world in general. It has a long and honorable history elsewhere.”

“That doesn’t help me here, though. I’d probably be called the next dark lord if it got out that I was the real Slytherin heir and could speak to snakes.” Harry said morosely.

Snape looked at Harry disapprovingly. “Self-pity is not at all an attractive trait. You will cease your wallowing immediately. Now, I will obtain a magic neutral bag of acromantula silk to contain the horcrux after it is found; I should be able to obtain one tomorrow. Pity I don’t already have one or we would be searching the room tonight. The goblins instructed me to secure the item and arrange it to be picked up and transferred to the bank as soon as possible as they apparently want to examine its magical aura to see if they can develop detection spells.”

“OH! I couldn’t tell the goblins because Slytherin wasn’t known for spell crafting, and I didn’t have permission to admit that I have access to any of the other founders, but I can tell you because you know about the founders’ portraits. Lady Ravenclaw developed a spell that she thinks can be used to find locations of all horcruxes created out of the same soul as long as you have physical access to one of them. She can’t cast it herself, of course, but she said she could teach you the spell and wand movements.  Only if you want to, of course.”

Snape sat back in his chair staring at Harry. “Only if I want. Only IF I want. Why would I possibly be interested in learning a new spell developed by one of the most renowned and accomplished spell crafters of British history? Of course I want to learn the spell! Lady Ravenclaw will come to the room if I ask for her?”

“You should let her know it’s going to be you asking for her using a house elf first. Call for Eldest when you are ready to go to the room, and let him know. He’ll tell her, and she will come to the portrait the room will create.”

“Eldest!” called Snape immediately. As the elf popped into the room, Snape waved Harry to leave, clearly impatient to get to the Room and learn this new spell. Harry left to go back to the dorm, and wondered if the professor would even remember that they hadn’t arranged what time they were going to meet at the Room in two days.

 

[1] I know that in canon Tom Riddle graduated in 1945 which was the same year that Dumbledore defeated Grindelwald. I also know that Riddle created his first Horcrux while a fifth year, before Dumbledore defeated Grindelwald. This is an AU, and I am changing Riddle’s age by a few years so he was a fifth year in Fall 1945, right after Grindelwald was defeated. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So things are moving right along. I am not sure how much more since I am writing as I go and I don't really have a fully fleshed out outline for this story. I've started another story that I'm not posting yet that I am trying a more structured approach - actually outlining the story, writing chapters and refining the outline as I go. I plan to try to finish that one entirely before I start posting to get a gauge for the difference, but this one remains my priority in writing since it's the one being posted that people are reading. I know I get frustrated some times with slow updates (which is why I'm trying really hard to keep up with the every other weekend post schedule), so the other story is more of an occasional thing, but I can already see that it is improving the overall writing to be able to go back and edit things from earlier based on what comes up as I write later chapters. I'll see. I want to finish this one first, and I have no idea how much longer it's going to take to get where I want to end up.


	26. There are HOW many horcruxes???

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Snape and Harry spend quality time together in the Room of Requirement.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So moving along. I'm not the happiest with this chapter, but it says what I need it to say so I'm posting it.
> 
> Again, I don't own Harry Potter.

Early in the morning two days later found Harry pacing back and forth in front of the Room of Requirement to call up the training dojo again. Professor Snape stood off to one side with his arms crossed. The professor had slipped a note Harry the prior night at dinner that just had 7AM written (and underlined) on it.

The unusual door that led to the dojo appeared in the wall and Harry slipped off his shoes and socks. “Professor, shoes aren’t allowed in the dojo because they will scuff the floor. You need to take them off or change them to slippers.”

“And what will you be wearing on your feet?”

“At the moment, I’ll be barefoot. Eventually I’ll move to training in a courtyard and have sandals on.”

Professor Snape raised his eyebrows, but waved his wand so his shoes changed to a soft slipper. “Well then?”

Harry took a deep breath and pulled open the door. Entering, he immediately moved toward the changing room off to the side to get into the gi his sensei expected him to wear while training. “I’ll be right back out, Professor. I need to change my clothes.”

Professor Snape looked over at Harry and nodded before going back to examining the room, and the weapons on the walls. As Harry entered the changing room he heard his sensei start to speak.

“And who would you be, to wander around my dojo without the courtesy of introducing yourself first?”

Harry was suddenly very glad he was not in the main room for that meeting.

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

Two hours later Harry leaned back against the wall opposite the currently blank wall where the Room was located and took some deep breaths. His sensei certainly hadn’t gone any softer on him with an audience, and whatever Professor Snape had learned from his sensei during their short conversation while Harry was changing made him comfortable enough to merely stand to the side and observe.

“Here.” An unmarked small brown jar was suddenly in his face. “Take this, and once we are finished here and you are back in your dorm rub it well into your legs and arms.”

Harry took the jar and looked up into Professor Snape’s face. The very fierce and forbidding looking face. Harry took the jar without asking any of the questions about it that he wanted to. “Thank you.”

“You said I needed to walk up and down the hall thinking of a place to hide things, correct?”

“Um, yeah. It works best if you are thinking of hiding something specific. Like I need to hide this jar,” Harry held up the brown jar the professor had just given him, “or I need to hide my shoes, or I need—“

“I get the idea. So I walk up and down, thinking about needing to hide something specific I am currently carrying.”

“Or you can think of something you need to get back in which case you will get a much smaller room that just has what you want to retrieve, but apparently for that to work it needs to be something you personally hid in the room. So you can’t walk up and down thinking that you need to get the Horcrux because you didn’t hide it to begin with.”

“But if I think of a place to hide my … whatever, I will get a larger room that has everything people have hidden, and I can remove things that other people have hidden?”

“That’s what I was told.”

“Some security, but not much security. How haphazard.” With that comment, the professor started pacing up and down, holding a small gray bag he had pulled out of a pocket in his hand. Once the door appeared, he moved to enter. “Stay here. I will return when I find the item and-“ the professor’s voice broke off when he got it open and saw the room that had been provided. Harry moved slightly so he could see past the professor’s body into the room. The very large, and very full, room.

“Wow. That’s a lot of stuff.”

“Indeed. So, I will return when I find the item, or when an hour has passed, whichever comes first.” With that comment, the professor started to enter the room.

“Wait, what am I supposed to do for an hour?”

“Work on your mediation exercises. I will be testing you to see if you are ready to start building shields this evening, and I expect you to be able to achieve a meditative state on request.” And with that comment, the door shut firmly behind him.

Harry didn’t think sitting on a cold stone floor in the middle of winter was going to be at all helpful in getting his mind to empty out let him actually meditate, but he wasn’t ever going to say that to the professor. He didn’t think Snape would be very kind in his comments if he tried. He got as comfortable as he could and started the exercises Gerald had taught him and he had been practicing several times a week for the past few months. ‘Huh, this isn’t as hard as I thought it would be. All that practicing must be actually doing something,’ Harry thought as the image of a clear sky he had started using to mediate with after his first flying lesson bloomed in his calming mind. With that, he stopped consciously thinking and let his mind soar in an endless sky.

“Mr. Potter!”

“Huh, what?” Harry started as he heard Professor Snape’s irritated tone. “That was fast.”

“That was nearly the entire hour I had allowed for this exercise. Clearly you can achieve a meditative trance if you were so deep in your own mind you didn’t notice the passing of time or hear me the first 3 times I called your name. Unless you were just sleeping with your eyes open,” snapped back the professor.

“No, I was meditating. I didn’t realize how much time had passed. Normally during the day I only mediate for about 20 min and I have an alarm set to pull me out of it. I only mediate without an alarm when I’m doing it right before going to bed, and I do normally end up falling asleep directly out of the mediation, so I can never tell exactly how long the trance part actually lasted.”

“Well I will be judging the truth of that this evening. You will meet me in the corridor side room an hour past the end of dinner. But if you are truly achieving a deep meditative state, be careful of doing so right before you plan to fall sleep going forward.  It is possible to stay in the trance all night and never actually transition into true sleep. While you will feel rested physically, it is not good for ongoing mental health to never dream, which is why the dreamless sleep potion is strictly monitored and tracked when it is proscribed, and is never supposed to be taken more than 3 days a week.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“Oh yes, it has been known for some time that if we are not allowed to dream it causes irreversible insanity. Not that you would be able to tell the difference in certain individuals. I think it might actually improve the former headmaster. But nevertheless. I was unable to locate the item in the time I had scheduled, but using the mark the founders have yet to be able to find a way to remove, and a minor modification of the spell the Lady Rowena developed to locate horcruxes using sympathetic magic I was able to narrow it down. It would be useless for a larger scale search since the mark only contains a link to the soul in question and not an actual piece of said soul; only the fact that I am searching in one room, albeit a large one, is making it possible at all, but I am down to perhaps a third of the room left to search.

The modified spell has a rather short range so I cannot simply use it to lead me to the object, and the founders were not wrong in telling you there is a multitude of other dangerous items in the room. So searching is somewhat slow as I happen to enjoy possessing all of my limbs and would like to continue to do so.

It is currently Tuesday. The students return to the castle in a few days on Friday January 3rd so as to have the weekend to settle back in before classes resume. So I expect them to actually be running all over the castle for the entire weekend before the reality of classes crushes them down again Monday morning.

However the Ministry personnel will also be back on Friday, and unlike the students taking the Express, they will be here the entire day instead of just the late afternoon and evening.  So that leaves us only tomorrow and the next day to locate the horcrux without potential interference. Meet here again tomorrow directly after lunch; it is best to vary the times to avoid patterns but that should give us enough time to finish, while still having Thursday to search if it is not.” With that final statement Professor Snape turned on his heel, and with his robe flaring out in a dramatic fashion, he strode off down the corridor toward the stairs.

‘Wow. I really wonder if he practices that.’

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxox

The next afternoon Harry was sitting just inside the lost and found version of the Room. The professor had tested his mind the night before after dinner and, in his words, found Harry’s progress to be adequate. Professor Snape had discussed a few different methods for occluding his mind such as creating walls to simply block intrusions, hiding his memories in different mental objects that were then hidden within his mindscape to make it harder for an intruder to find them, and the most difficult option of creating false memories so an intruder didn’t realize he was being diverted or blocked from the real memories. The latter was much harder, but ultimately would be much more useful.

But for now Harry was reading through a potions book the professor had shoved into his hands right after they entered the Room with the terse instruction to read about reagents. But since the professor had immediately strode off to continue searching for the horcrux without explaining what reagents were, and of course the book wouldn’t have anything resembling an index or a table of contents, he was slogging through the book from the beginning.

‘This is sooo boring. But I just know that the professor will be quizzing me on it at some point. But really, really, really boring.’

Harry continued to slowly page through the book reading about potion development, and essays by famous potions masters about their various creations, and finally he hit a section in one of the essays where the author talked about reagents and how he made his breakthrough by attempting to use different reagents that had similar effects until he found one that didn’t cause the potion to explode or otherwise fail spectacularly. ‘This still isn’t telling me exactly what a reagent IS though’ Harry thought, rather annoyed by this point. ‘I mean, yeah, I get that reagents are something that cause the potion to react somehow, and there are different ones that can cause the same effects, and I think he’s saying that there are other different ones that do different effects, but is that all?’

“Mr. Potter!” came a shout suddenly.

“Yes, Professor?”

“Stand up. I am going to direct you to my current position. Do NOT touch ANYTHING as I guide you through the room.” The professor had stressed the word anything by dropping his voice and practically hissing the word instead of shouting it louder. It certainly got Harry’s attention.  He stood up, gently laying the book the professor had given him on the floor as he did so.

“Yes, Professor. I’m ready.” Harry replied.

Harry spent the next 10 minutes walking a short distance, shouting to Professor Snape that he was at an intersection or branching and what he could see, and then following the next section as directed until he reached the next point where there was more than one way to go. He passed all sorts of things along the way, but was very careful to keep to the center of the walkway and not touch anything he saw, no matter how interesting it looked (like the pile of old brooms he passed at one point). Eventually he reached Professor Snape, who was standing in front of a weird looking statue with a tarnished silver circlet sitting on a pile of junk next to it.

“Good. Now, I want you to say the following spell in Parseltongue while pointing your wand at this diadem.” Professor Snape instructed. “The spell is ‘Revelare abscondita maledictiones istæ’, and the English translation is ‘reveal hidden curses’. I am not sure if you need to be thinking about the Latin or the English when incanting in Parseltongue, or if it even matters. The wand movement is to point your wand and trace a small circle around the outside border of the item in question. Like this.” Harry watched as Professor Snape did the spell with no visible results.

“Um, I can’t tell when I am speaking in Parseltongue or English. It all sounds like English to me. How do I make sure I am speaking Parseltongue?”

“Have you…Yes, you said it sounds the same. When did you speak Parseltongue before?” asked the professor.

“Uh, I guess I must have been speaking it when the Dursley’s had to take me to the zoo on Dudley’s birthday because Mrs. Figg broke her leg. And Lord Salazar speaks it to me sometimes, and then I reply back in the same language.”

“Well I don’t speak Parseltongue so that won’t work. But what did you mean about the zoo?”

“Oh, it was in the reptile house. I saw a boa constrictor that looked really bored, and said something about how it must feel all locked up like that, and nearly fell over when it talked back to me.”

“So you were looking at a snake, and talking to it, and it came out in Parseltongue.”

“I guess.”

Professor Snape nodded and raised his wand. “Serpentsoria!” Harry took a step back in surprise as a smallish snake with light colored scales poured out of the professor’s wand to curl on the floor at his feet. “This is a grass snake, one of the non-poisonous species of snake native to this land. Talk to it to make sure you are speaking in Parseltongue – I will nod at you if you are – and then perform the spell.

“Uh…Ok. How will I know if it worked? I didn’t see anything when you did the spell.”

“You didn’t see anything because the spell didn’t uncover anything. But Rowena said that experiments with Salazar incanting in Parseltongue showed that normal Latin casting won’t uncover spells that were cast in Parseltongue. Only when a revealing spell was completed using Parseltongue did any Parseltongue enchantments or curses show up. I don’t have anything enchanted using Parseltongue that you can practice…Wait. Before you cast on the diadem step over here for a moment.”

Harry followed the professor (and the snake which was also following Professor Snape) a few steps back away from the statue with the diadem.

“Here, watch what I am doing.” With that statement, Professor Snape waved his wand in a small pattern in the direction of a box perched on top of a small pile of stuff and said “Colloportus!” in a firm tone. “That charm locks what it is applied to be it a door, or a box, or a trunk etc. So now,” Professor Snape repeated his earlier incantation. “Revelare abscondita maledictiones istæ!” This time, a faint orange glow surrounded the box. “This shows the box is under the effects of a potentially harmful spell. This particular locking spell falls under this category as it can be used to seal someone in as in a prison and if they do not possess magic, or have had their wand taken and are incapable of performing wandless magic, there is no way to unseal the door. Only the unlocking charm will release the lock, like this. Alohomora!” And with that, the professor reached out and easily opened the box. “Try to cast ‘Colloportus’ on the box in Parseltongue using the snake to change languages. We will verify the box sealed, and then you can practice casting the reveal spell to ensure it is working before you try it on the diadem.”

“Okay. I can do this.” Harry took a deep breath and then did as he had been instructed. “That was in English, Mr. Potter. Alohomora! Try again.” Harry looked at the snake and said “ _So do you remember anything before the professor brought you here?”_

 _“A speaker! You are a speaker”_ the snake pulled back and looked at Harry. It was hard on a snake’s face, but Harry would have sworn it looked shocked. Harry noticed Professor Snape nodding in the background, but since the snake was answering him, Harry already knew he succeeded in switching languages.

“ _Yes, I am a speaker. Hold on, I need to speak a spell using the serpent’s tongue, and I wanted to make sure I was speaking it before I tried.”_ Harry turned to the box. “ _Lock this item!”_

“Yes, that was in Parseltongue,” commented Professor Snape.

Harry stepped closer so he could touch the box and confirmed it was sealed. He stepped back again and tried the reveal spell. “ _Reveal hidden curses!”_ he said while tracing his wand as the professor had shown him. This time, the same faint orange glow surrounded the box that had been seen when the professor did the spell in Latin. “ _It worked! Look Professor, it worked!_ ”

“Was that addressed to me? English would be preferred if it was,” came back the professor’s exceedingly dry reply.

Harry shook his head and focused on the professor. “It worked!” he said again, in English this time.

“Indeed it did. Now repeat the exercise on the diadem.”

Feeling much more confident, Harry turned back to the snake so he would switch languages back to Parseltongue. “ _Thank you for your help. Can you come back the other way with me so I can do the spell again?”_

“ _Why do you need to keep doing the spell?”_ asked the snake in a bored tone. Harry was amazed that the snake language apparently had the ability to convey emotion like boredom, but decided to just roll with it.

“ _I was practicing the first time to make sure it worked before trying it for real. Now I’m going to do it where I really need to.”_

_“It is of no matter. But a frog or something similar would be appreciated when you are finished. There is nothing that smells of food in this place.”_

_“I’ll make sure you get a frog or something for your help. Or we move you somewhere you can find food.”_ As Harry finished that last statement to the snake, he looked up at the diadem he was once again in front of. “ _Reveal hidden curses!_ ” he said, once again moving his wand in the proscribed pattern.

This time nothing appeared to happen. “Does that mean there aren’t any curses on the item?” asked Harry, after making sure to look at Professor Snape before he started speaking.

“It would appear that way. Step back.” Harry moved back about 5 paces. “Further back.” Harry moved as far as he could while still keeping Professor Snape in sight. “I supposed that will have to do. If I appear to be cursed, or ask you to get help, go back to the door and have one of the castle elves fetch Madam Pomphrey.”

The professor turned to the diadem, pulled out the same small grey bag he had been holding yesterday, and used the end to pick up the diadem, pulling the bag over the diadem as he picked it up so it was completely covered without him ever touching the diadem directly. “Alright, back to the corridor so I can reset the room.”

“Why are you resetting the room?”

“I do not want to even think about trying a completely new spell in such a chaotic environment. I will be thinking of a smaller nearly empty room to do this, as well as requesting Lady Rowena observe from a portrait. You will be waiting outside with Eldest in case something goes horribly wrong when I cast magic at the horcrux.”

Harry gulped. He couldn’t see the professor’s face, but his tone of voice was more than adequate to get across just how bad the professor thought something horrible could be.

Harry picked up the potions book as they walked out of the Room, and was met by Eldest in the corridor as the door dissolved into a blank wall again. Without speaking, they moved to the opposite wall again while Professor Snape paced to reset the room. Just before he reached for the handle of the new door the professor turned slightly to face Eldest. “The Lady Rowena knows I am about to try her new spell?”

“Eldest told her before popping up to this place as yous instructed last night. The Lady will be waiting.”

Without another word the professor entered the room and shut the door firmly behind him. The door that promptly disappeared.

“What! Where did the door go?”

“If whoevers goes in the room is thinking of privacy when theys be setting the room, the room makes sure no ones else can get in after the door be closed.” said Eldest.

“So if there is a problem, how will we know? How will we be able to help? Can you still get in the room?”

“Elveses not able to enter the room when someones wants privacy unless we is called for-“

Harry interrupted the old elf. “But that means he’ll be trapped and-“

Eldest spoke a little louder to cut Harry off. “The Lady can bes calling Eldest if help is needed.”

“Oh, okay. I guess that makes sense.” Harry leaned back against the wall again from where he had stood straight up in his panic. “Oh, hey, I promised I’d get a frog or something for this snake in return for its help earlier. Do you know-“ Another house elf holding a few tadpoles popped into the corridor and dropped them in front of the snake that had followed Harry out of the room and was laying on the floor near his feet. Without missing a beat the snake struck out at the writhing mass and started swallowing one of the creatures whole. Harry shuddered and looked away.

After a few more minutes, just as Harry was thinking about opening up the potions book again (no matter how boring he found it, it would still be something to do), the door to the room abruptly rematerialized as Professor Snape jerked it open with a violent pull. He stared wide eyed in shock at Harry.

“What? What’s wrong?” Harry asked in a panic. Whatever had put that expression on the professor’s face could NOT be good.

“He…he…he…The Dark Lord has five horcruxes. FIVE of those things.”

“Oh. Well, I guess that proves  –‘s theory that I ended up with that leech thing because Tom’s soul was unstable due to making more than one Horcrux.” Harry replied, not sure what else to say.  He didn’t think five was that large of a number, but there was probably something about the process or whatever that he wasn’t getting.

Professor Snape stared at Harry a bit longer after that statement, and then shook his head. “Five horcruxes. I’d say no wonder he’s insane, but he must have been crazy to begin with. Five horcruxes.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Continued thanks for the kudos and comments on this story. With that said, I am NOT abandoning the story, but my resolve to post every other weekend will be tested for the next month or two. My mother severely injured herself and is in a back brace for 3 months. That means she will need someone with her to help with day to day things since she can't bend, twist, or lift things. 
> 
> Since I have the ability in my day job to work remotely with a laptop, and my boss is super nice and supportive, my normal 'work from home one day a week' perk of the job just turned into 'work remotely from another state in another time zone' for the next minimum 4 weeks, reassess my mom's status at that time.
> 
> I hop a plane tomorrow morning and will be in TX (live in PA) until further notice. I will have my work laptop (which I am not posting fanfic from), my smartphone (which i have no idea how to post from, or the ability to use word on, and I WON'T write directly into the posting interface), and access to whatever laptop my mom has (she apparently is switching from a dell windows 10 laptop to some sort of Mac). Normally I use a desktop PC running windows 7. 
> 
> So if I can use Mom's laptop, and I manage to find time to write around maintaining my work plus helping my mom, and manage to concentrate to write while in that situation, I will post again in two weeks. But please don't count on it.


	27. How to Defeat a Dark Lord (or two!) in just a few (not so easy) steps

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I'm back in PA. I still don't own Harry Potter. And my cushion of written material has shrunk, but I wanted to get another chapter out before the start of the new year as a thank you for everyone who reads, gives kudos, and comments on my story. I appreciate each and every one of you, even if I do suck at responding to them.

“So the next thing that needs to be done is track down the other horcruxes.” Said Professor Snape when they met up again later that night after dinner. Professor Snape had dismissed Harry after he came out of the Room, saying he needed to communicate with the goblins before discussing next moves.

“I thought that was what you did up in the room earlier. How else did you figure out how many there were? I thought you used Lady Ravenclaw’s spell to locate the other horcruxes.” asked Harry, a little confused.

“The spell Lady Rowena developed showed how many other objects sharing the same soul there were – in this case it showed five, and the goblins and I believe there are four more actual horcruxes plus the wraith form of Tom Riddle – and bearings with distances. Which meant since you had a soul shard as well that a total of five of those abominations… At any rate, taking a bearing and distance from the location I performed the spell, and actually locating the specific item used as a horcrux are two different matters. What if the bearing and distance lead to another room like the version of the Room of Requirement we found the diadem in? Or the Ministry complex? We would still need to narrow things down and determine which of the items was used. I am surprised to find myself relieved that my dark mark has not yet been removed since I can use it to locate these items one by one, but I do not expect it to be easy. And since all of them are some distance away, and break is ending, it is going to be difficult to devise a cover where we can both be absent from the school without it being noted.”

“You want me with you?” asked Harry.

“You are still a Parselmouth, are you not? Just because this particular horcrux was not trapped or warded does not mean they will all share that condition. Of course I will want you with me if we need to be the ones track the various items down. But that is for the possible future. I let the goblins know that I have access to a spell that determined basic location information on the other items, and have sent the information I discovered to the goblins with the number, bearings, and distances involved, as well as the precise location that I performed the spell from. They will research the locations identified to determine which one has Riddle’s wraith and which ones need to be explored for horcruxes. If warranted, they may attempt to locate any of the horcruxes on their own without our assistance, but they have been notified of our abilities, yours to cast in Parseltongue and mine to use the dark mark as a homing device when in close enough proximity to a horcrux, which is why I believe we will be needed for the final identification.

I have also sent the horcrux we found to the goblins for further study and to research safe destruction methods. While theoretically they could use it as a locator device by taking it to each area identified and having a wizard repeat the spell over and over to close in on an item, I recommended against using the horcrux in this way as it would expose it and risk it being lost. Particularly since this horcrux is such an esteemed relic. I believe they will be having one of their human employees cast the locator spell once more from Gringotts to give a cross check on the various locations, and then they are going to try to cleanse the horcrux from the diadem and destroy it separately so such a priceless artifact is not lost.  That may not be possible, but it is certainly worth attempting.”

“I don’t understand. They were able to cleanse the piece of Riddle’s soul out of me. Why wouldn’t they be able to take it out of the diadem?”

“You were not a true horcrux, and as such the soul piece did not have the same anchoring to you as it will to the diadem. The ritual to purposefully create a horcrux is supposed to bind the soul intrinsically with the chosen object. That is one reason to choose objects that people would be loath to destroy.  Of course it makes them desired objects that people will look for as well. I suppose we should be grateful,” Professor Snape looked pained as he said the word grateful Harry noticed, “that it seems likely the Dark Lord choose unique items. If the diadem is indicative of his choices, that is. If he had chosen a random stone and dropped it in the ocean once it was his horcrux this would be much more difficult. And it is already exceedingly difficult.”

“Oh.”

“Indeed. So the goblins will proceed as far as they can, and provide updates to me as progress is made. If they determine that they need our assistance, I will be contacted to devise a reasonable cover for our mutual absence. This will probably be a Saturday detention wherein we will ostensibly be gathering potions ingredients, as I feel that is the most likely scenario to cover our absence from the school without question.”

“Um…”

“I will make sure there are available ingredients to show for your supposed detention should it come to that, ones that match what a first year could reasonably be expected to gather.”

“Okay.”

“Hopefully it will not come to that and the goblins will be able to locate the items without us, but I prefer to plan for possible contingencies rather than rely on hope. That never seems to work for me.

“Um. Okay.”

“Tomorrow you are free to do what you choose; I presume that will include another lesson at your dojo aspect of the Room.  If you require more salve, send a message with an elf and I will provide more via the same method.”

“Okay.”

Professor Snape raised an eyebrow at Harry. “Have you anything else to say other than ‘okay’ and ‘um’?”

“Um-“

“Obviously not. The weekend will be a madhouse as is usual when students return to the castle.  For now, plan to meet here after dinner next Tuesday. That should be sufficient time to obtain an updated status from the goblins. Should something earthshattering occur prior to that, I will contact you and expect the same courtesy in return.”

“Okay,” replied Harry with a slight smile, figuring he could have said fine or something else along those lines, but since the professor had made a point to call out his vocabulary choices he might as well keep it up. And the word did fit the situation.

Professor Snape raised his hand to pinch his nose and shook his head. “You may go.”

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxox

The weekend was a flurry of catching up with his friends. Even after several months in the castle, Harry was often surprised by the fact that there were people his own age that liked him and wanted to spend time with him. Particularly those who really wanted to spend time with Harry and not ‘The-Boy-Who-Lived’. He heard about Hermione’s skiing trip with her parents, grimaced with sympathy to Justin’s complaints about the stuffy parties his parents dragged him to, and in general listened to the various students talk about what they had done while away from the school. He was even able to share some of his own holiday – showing off some of the books he had been given by the Ministry person for example – though not all of it. He certainly wasn’t going to talk about the wards, or horcruxes, but he talked about watching the epic snowball fight started by the Weasley twins and other random things that had happened.

One notable interaction was with Draco Malfoy. The blond boy hadn’t interacted much with Harry once Harry had sorted to Hufflepuff. They didn’t share many classes, and Draco had made it very clear he firmly believed all Hufflepuffs were duffers, and that he thought Harry wasn’t worth his time after his sorting.

 But something had changed over the holiday, for while Harry was walking back down to the dorms on Sunday evening after dinner, Draco called out to him. Harry stopped and turned, and the group of students he was with paused as well.

“Yes, Malfoy? Did you need something?”

Draco came to a stop of his own a few feet away from Harry, flanked by two other large Slytherin first years. In a very formal tone, with a serious look on his face he said “Potter, I wished to extend my family’s congratulations on your ousting of the former Headmaster. My father had been trying to have him replaced for years, but no one would hear anything negative against the great Dumbledore. You managed it in less than four months. Well done.”

Harry blinked in surprise. He wasn’t sure exactly how to respond to that statement. “Um, thank you, I guess? I mean, that’s not what I expected, and it was really the goblins and the aurors that did the ousting. I just asked a question about my mail after someone pointed out that I wasn’t really getting any and I probably should be.” While Harry was certainly pleased that Dumbledore was gone, he knew the former headmaster still had the weight of years of reputation and tradition behind him and the public campaign to deny the goblins and have him reinstated was picking up steam. If that happened, Harry did not want Dumbledore to hear that Harry had deliberately tried to get him in trouble.

Still standing a little stiffly with and with a serious mien Draco replied “Nonetheless, the Malfoy family offers congratulations.”

“Then the Potter family accepts your congratulations. Thank you,” and Harry nodded in respect to Draco. Draco drew himself up straight (which looked a little silly on an eleven-year old, but whatever) and gave a grave nod in return before turning away to follow the corridor down to the area of the dungeons that contained the Slytherin dorms.

“That was weird, what the heck was that about?” Harry wondered out loud as he started walking back toward the Hufflepuff dorms.

“If it’s what I think it is, it’s related to how wizards view families, a piece I didn’t talk about last term. I can explain it a little better once we get back to the Sett.” Susan replied.

“Thanks, Sue. I get so lost sometimes. I really wish there was some sort of Wizarding culture class the way there is a Muggle Studies class.”

“No you don’t. The Muggle studies class is a joke,” said an older Hufflepuff who had been in the group that had stopped to listen to the exchange.  “You need at least an Owl in Muggle Studies to get a Ministry position, so my dad insisted I take it, but I’ve talked about what I’m learning with some of my friends who are muggleborn or half-bloods raised in the muggle world and they say it’s at least a hundred years out of date. So the last thing you want is a wizard studies class with similar inaccuracies.”

The crowd laughed at that, and then laughed louder when Hannah chimed in with “But the wizarding world changes so slowly, having a class that was talking about how things were only 100 years ago would be really up to date stuff!”

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

Once back in the common room, Harry and Susan along with all of the other first year Hufflepuffs broke off into the first year’s study room.

“Okay, so you know how I talked about how families share a pool of family magic, and owe allegiance to a Patriarch, right?” Susan started off. The various students around her all nodded. Even Ernie McMillian and Zach Smith who hadn’t been around for the first conversation a few months ago nodded, but as they were both pure bloods they were probably familiar with the practice. Harry wasn’t sure why they decided to join in on this one, but if Sue wasn’t upset about it, he figured it wasn’t any of his business.

“So, there aren’t that many wizard families really. Not compared to the muggle world. So for purebloods to keep themselves pure, and the definition of what constitutes pure changes depending on what family you are talking to, part of being a member of the family includes keeping track of everyone else who could be considered family, which means tracking to some extent people who married out of the family.

But more importantly in terms of explaining what happened after dinner, the family is considered as a unit as well as the individual members. I talked a little about that when I was explaining why we don’t talk bad about members of the family in the presence of non-family. And families are respected as families, as much as they are respected for individuals. So, and I’m not trying to be insensitive, but if there were other Potters left they would have some degree of fame from when you defeated You-Know-Who. Because you are a Potter, and good things that you do reflect well on the Potter family in general. So being related to the person who defeated You-Know-Who would have raised their status too.

Now you as the head of the Potter family accomplished something that the current head of the Malfoy family has been trying to do for years. So even though Draco Malfoy doesn’t really like you and has made fun of you in the past, his father who is the head of the Malfoy family clearly instructed his son to convey those thanks. That’s why Malfoy said he was saying thanks for the Malfoy family. And why he was entirely serious when doing so and didn’t snigger or point or do any of the things he’s been doing since your sorting. His father as the patriarch of the Malfoy family is offering respect and possibly a return favor because what happened to Dumbledore happened because of you. Draco Malfoy has to fall in line with that. He may not become best buds with you or anything, but I think you’ll find he is a lot more respectful when he interacts with you in the future. Unless something else happens to change it, of course.” Susan concluded.

“Okay, so his dad wanted Dumbledore out, Dumbledore is out and Malfoy senior thinks it’s because of me, so he sent his son to say thanks? That’s what that was?” Harry questioned. “That’s mental. I mean, I didn’t do anything.”

“Oh yes you did, Potter.” Said Ernie McMillian. “My dad was talking about it over the hols as well. He’s not convinced Dumbledore is really at fault here, since he was your legal guardian so Dad is of the opinion that he had the right to be reading your mail.” Harry opened his mouth to protest that but Ernie cut him off before he got a word out. “I know, I know, Dumbledore wasn’t your fid…fid…he wasn’t your guardian for money stuff, and that’s what counts here and why he’s being sought for a trial in front of the goblin courts. But whether that’s right or not, Dad does agree with Malfoy that you are responsible. He’s not happy about it like Malfoy apparently is, but even though the charge came from the goblins and the aurors and Unspeakables are the ones doing investigations, you were the start.”

“So, your Dad is blaming me because Dumbledore broke the law? That’s more mental than the Malfoy thing. I didn’t make Dumbledore intercept my mail or steal my stuff, or anything like that!” Harry protested strongly.

The room full of first years broke out into an uproar. Finally Susan, who normally held back but was clearly upset at the yelling, did something with her wand that released a loud bang. “Enough already! Harry isn’t--”

“What is going on in here? What part of QUIET study room don’t you kids get?” The door to the study room was abruptly opened and the fifth year prefects Porsha and William were standing in the door way.

“Sorry. We were talking about something that happened a little while ago, and something else came up that got us a little excited.”

“And what was that?” drawled William.

“Potter says the Headmaster stole from him!” shouted Zach Smith.

Harry was hunched into the chair he was sitting in. The students all around him yelling brought back memories of going to school with Dudley and Dudley getting his gang to surround him, yell at him, and eventually beat on him. He wasn’t having a flashback; he knew where he was and that these students weren’t likely to hit him or anything, but he still wasn’t going to be comfortable with a group of people around him all shouting. Especially when they were shouting at him.

“Okay, hold up. Did any of you give Potter a chance to explain?” asked Porsha.

“But, he’s Dumbledore!” replied Smith.

“So that would be a no then. Perhaps we should try that before you try to shout the castle down,” said Porsha.

“Harry, could you explain what you meant when you said the FORMER headmaster Dumbledore stole from you?” asked Susan.

“So you know how I was showing some of the books my parents used to have yesterday? Well, the Ministry people who have been here investigating found them and all this other stuff that belonged to me all hidden away. It looked like he took a whole bunch of stuff from our house after that Halloween and kept it.”

“But he’s your guardian. He has the right to secure valuables.” Came a rebuttal from Ernie McMillian.

“But it wasn’t packed away in a box marked ‘Harry Potter’, it wasn’t given to the goblins to be secured in the Potter vaults, and it wasn’t given to my Aunt and Uncle that I was living with. Not that I’m not happy about that last since they probably would have thrown it all out. But he also didn’t give any of it back to me once I got to the castle. And it was mixed in with stuff that belonged to other people.  So even if you say he was keeping it for safe keeping, why not tell me he had it? And why wasn’t it clearly identified as Potter property? Other than the stuff like the books with bookplates that were clearly labeled from before he got his hands on it. The Auror who returned it to me said they couldn’t think of any reason for him to have all this stuff, and there’s no official record of him taking it or having it. He even had my parents’ wands and some other really important family heirlooms! And never told anyone that he did. That’s stealing.”

Mentioning the wands did the trick. Every single pureblood in the room shuddered and immediately agreed that Dumbledore had stolen from the Potters. Wands were practically sacred in the magical world, with wands held in families as legacies for use of later generations or buried with the deceased. Wands only left a family if they were stolen or the entire family was dead. Period. No matter what reasoning Dumbledore had, or arguments he tried to make through his proxies, every pureblood agreed the wands should have been returned to the Potter vaults right away. So if they were with the things that Dumbledore had, then Dumbledore had stolen. The non-purebloods for the most part had been on Harry’s side to begin with, and were confused by the about face the purebloods had done. But once the reasoning was explained to the muggleborn and muggle-raised half-bloods, they understood why the purebloods changed stances so quickly.

“You should write to the Daily Prophet and let them know about the wands,” Ernie said pompously. “My dad wouldn’t go on about Dumbledore being defamed if he knew the man had taken family wands, and a lot of the support the man has would be eliminated.”

“Am I allowed? I thought it was still part of the investigation?” Harry questioned.

“I can find out for you, if you want” Susan said softly. “I agree with Ernie, if you can let the public know he had your parents’ wands that’s a really big thing.”

“How can you find out?”

“Remember, my aunt is the director of the DMLE. I’ll send her a letter and she’ll let me know if you can make a statement about your things. Since they were returned to you I think it should be fine; the aurors would have cataloged them before they returned them to you.”

“I just don’t want to cause any issues.” Harry said.

“I’ll check with her. She’ll know for sure.”

“Thanks Susan.”

Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

Two days later once breakfast was over, Susan handed Harry a note from her aunt that let Harry know that he could let the public know about his stolen items if he wanted. The DMLE had already drawn up documents amending the initial detainment orders for Dumbledore to include that he was now wanted for questioning for crimes under wizard law as well as under goblin law. He still wasn’t allowed to discuss anything concerning his guardianship in general or Sirius Black in particular, because that was still in something she called discovery and she didn’t want anything to potentially interfere, but once his belongings were returned to him he was free to discuss them with anyone he wanted, including the press.  Harry decided this was something he needed advice on, and resolved to talk to both Gerald and Professor Snape before sending a statement to the Daily Prophet. Since he already had a meeting with the professor scheduled for that night, he decided to talk to Gerald during his free period and Professor Snape afterwards. Gerald didn’t really have much advice to give; he felt his knowledge was too out of date, but he agreed that Professor Snape should be able to provide some reasonable advice.

So later that evening after dinner was over, Harry made his way to the small hidden room to meet with the potions professor. For once, he was in the room before his teacher, so he sat in his usual chair and fidgeted while he waited, only to jump in surprise a few moments later when his professor’s distinctive voice was heard. “I do believe this is the first time in my memory that a non-Slytherin student appeared eager for a scheduled meeting with me. I should take note.”

“Professor! I didn’t hear you come in.”

“Obviously. Now, we should not speak long. I have heard—“ Professor Snape broke off speaking abruptly, staring at Harry who was practically vibrating in his seat, and had moved his arms so he was literally sitting on his hands in an effort to avoid waving for attention. “I can see you have learned some respect, as you have not interrupted me to blurt out whatever earthshattering information you are so obviously eager to impart. Very well, since I clearly will fail to have your true attention until you have shared your news, please, go ahead.” He waved his hand at Harry as he finished speaking and fell silent, looking at Harry with a calm face and a raised eyebrow.

“So the aurors gave me back stuff from my parents that the headmaster had. And I was talking a little bit about it with my friends over the weekend. And at first it was all crazy because so many of them didn’t want to believe that Dumbledore stole from me since he was my guardian. And some of their parents thought it was wrong and since Dumbledore was my guardian he was fine to do what he did. But once I said he had had my parent’s wands it was all like ‘whoa, Dumbledore’s a thief, who knew’. And Director Bones agreed I could tell that to the newspaper, but I figured I needed some advice on the best way, and Gerald said it was a good idea but I should ask you for help since it’s been so long since he was alive and goblins don’t really have a press like wizards do. So I need help to let people know that Dumbledore really is a thief more than just what the goblins say about my mail.” Harry blurted this out in a massive rush without taking a breath.

Professor Snape sat back in his chair, closed his eyes, and pinched his nose with the fingers of one hand. Harry was starting to feel bad when the Professor did that, because it invariably meant that Harry had said or done something that the professor didn’t like, or didn’t want to deal with, or didn’t know how to handle.

“And just when were you in contact with the director of the DMLE?” he said in pained tone of voice.

“Well Susan, she’s her niece you know, so after Ernie said I should write to the paper so his dad would know how bad Dumbledore was and would stop supporting him, and I was worried that I couldn’t do that because of having to keep quiet about things, so Susan offered to write to her aunt and ask. And her aunt replied and gave permission. See?” Harry held out the short note he had been given.

Professor Snape opened his eyes and reached out to take the note, which he proceeded to read out loud.

“Mr. Potter. Thank you for your inquiry as to allowable media disclosure regarding your personal items. The DMLE has amended the detainment order on Mr. Dumbledore to include charges of theft of personal property which covers his taking your family wands. While an amended order is less obvious than a new order would be, it is still a matter of public record and unlikely to escape notice from the press for long. You are therefore clear to notify the newspapers and other media outlets about your returned property.

You are not cleared at this point to discuss any other issues related to your guardianship or in particular Mr. Black as the Sirius Black situation is still in discovery with no charges yet filed, and additional press speculation, particularly if it contained quotations from yourself, could taint the proceedings. Thank you again for your diligence in maintaining security protocols. Please feel free to contact my office directly with any future inquiries surrounding your case. Sincerely Director Bones, DMLE.”

The professor handed the note back to Harry and stared at him in silence. After a few moments Harry got impatient with waiting and blurted out “So will you help me?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So mom is still in the brace, but allowed out of it for a few hours each day. She's due to start physical therapy in Jan and healing as well as a women with advanced osteoporosis that is also in her mid eighties can be expected to heal.


End file.
